UK-STD testing in pubs

[gam197]

UK is opening “youth” clinics (age 13 and up). I thought this article was interesting in that the sexually transmitted disease rates are so high that this woman is doing STD’s tests in the pubs.

I can imagine what would happen if they went into the major bars in the U. S. cities and tried this approach.

wigantoday.net/wigannews/Clubbers-in-VD-spot-checks.4258626.jp

Wigan nightclubbers are to be asked to take part in VD spot checks this weekend…

It is an initiative from the Brook Wigan and Leigh Outreach Team who will carry out screen tests for the venereal disease in local pubs, asking punters to provide urine samples…

The move follows a successful pilot scheme in Leigh in April when Brook visited pubs and carried out 17 chlamydia screenings. Four people tested positive…

Those who agree to be screened for chlamydia will be asked to provide a urine sample to the team and give them their name, and contact details.
They will then either be sent a text message or a letter informing them of the result and offered antibiotics if necessary.

 

[nate12387]

Wow, I am amazed at this. Just wow.

 

[thomfra]

Wow, I am amazed at this. Just wow.

Why are you so amazed?

 

[Kaninchen]

It should be remembered that the legal ‘drinking age’ in the UK is 18 not 21. Allowing for the fact that some 16-17 year olds also (inevitably) manage to get into pubs/clubs, if teenagers are a target group for chlamydia screening then they are logical places to find them in their natural habitat.

 

[CentralFLJames]

This should not be so alarming. What should be alarming is that we have an epidemic now in the west. Talk to any public health nurse in the USA to get the sobering reality of what is going on. I have heard from such a source the grim reality. In my county which is a mixture of middle class and upper middle class the STD rate for 16-27 year olds is as high as 70%!

This includes all varieties of STDs (including herpes, chlamydia, and non-specific forms as well as the nastier ones such as syphilis, gonorrhea). In other words, if one have a teenage child and he/she is dating they are statistically speaking ‘part of the problem’ if they are not married and in a monogamous relationship at a fairly early age and living absolutely chaste before then.

The moral decline of the west is literally killing us…

James

 

[thomfra]

This should not be so alarming. What should be alarming is that we have an epidemic now in the west. Talk to any public health nurse in the USA to get the sobering reality of what is going on. I have heard from such a source the grim reality. In my county which is a mixture of middle class and upper middle class the STD rate for 16-27 year olds is as high as 70%!

This includes all varieties of STDs (including herpes, chlamydia, and non-specific forms as well as the nastier ones such as syphilis, gonorrhea). In other words, if one have a teenage child and he/she is dating they are statistically speaking ‘part of the problem’ if they are not married and in a monogamous relationship at a fairly early age and living absolutely chaste before then.

The moral decline of the west is literally killing us…

James

Well - there are of course methods to reduce the spread (condoms etc), and free screenings. That’d certainly help. 70% sounds kinda high though.

 

[CentralFLJames]

Well - there are of course methods to reduce the spread (condoms etc), and free screenings. That’d certainly help. 70% sounds kinda high though.

The best one’s that have always worked best in the past have been moral restraint and abstinence. Condoms with a failure rate as high as 10% are just a false sense of security that encourage more rolls of the dice and in my opinion are as integral part now of the problem. It’s insanity to increase the frequency of illicit behavior as a means to solve the problem. In other words at a 10% failure rate - toss the dice 100 times in a year and 10 times one is exposed to disease or pregnancy. Ironic is that they treat pregnancy the same way as they do disease now too (through abortion).

In the west, it seems that reason along with morality has itself become diseased.

James

 

[thomfra]

The best one’s that have always worked best in the past have been moral restraint and abstinence. Condoms with a failure rate as high as 10% are just a false sense of security that encourage more rolls of the dice and in my opinion are as integral part now of the problem. It’s insanity to increase the frequency of illicit behavior as a means to solve the problem. In other words at a 10% failure rate - toss the dice 100 times in a year and 10 times one is exposed to disease or pregnancy. Ironic is that they treat pregnancy the same way as they do disease now too (through abortion).

In the west, it seems that reason along with morality has itself become diseased.

James

No - they don’t fail once every 10 times. That’s absolute rubbish.

100 partners a year??!??!?!?! As for pregnancy. There is only a very narrow window of oppurtunity for conception to occur each month (maybe 72 hours). (ask anybody who has been trying to have kids). Of course no sex is fail safe. But that’s just not going to happen I’m afraid.

 

[CentralFLJames]

No - they don’t fail once every 10 times. That’s absolute rubbish.

100 partners a year??!??!?!?! As for pregnancy. There is only a very narrow window of oppurtunity for conception to occur each month (maybe 72 hours). (ask anybody who has been trying to have kids). Of course no sex is fail safe. But that’s just not going to happen I’m afraid.

You really need to get educated on the numbers.

And there is no need for hysteria nor in jumping to false conclusions about 100 different partners a year. The 100 times per year example could be with one or a few partners or 100 different partners having sex one time a year or 2 different partners having sex 50 times per year. Though the population sampling gets skewed statistically based on how its grouped since the underlying statistic assumes a binomial distribution and random sampling. So please use your head a little bit here.

Actually I was being conservative on the numbers. The more typical case is a 12% failure rate. The numbers are about double the failure rate in typical usage of the female version of this condom. If you don’t believe me here is a reference for you. Do your homework.
Ask Alice - Famous Columbia University Medical PhD:

Original info here: goaskalice.columbia.edu/2219.html
…
During a year of typical condom use, between 10 and 15 out of 100 sexually active women will become pregnant. During a year of perfect condom use, that number drops to between 2 and 3 out of 100 sexually active women becoming pregnant. Just for the record, 21 percent (typical use) and 5 percent (perfect use) of women who use the female condom experience an unintended pregnancy within the first year of use.
…

With **typical **use, the HIV transmission rate increased to between 10 and 15 percent. Condoms can also reduce the risk of other STIs, but their exact effectiveness is harder to determine.

Of course the condom manufacturer’s want to use the “perfect” numbers using unrealistic laboratory results. In truth no human can sustain perfect levels of usage for long since its simply not natural for a person in the passion of desire to say “hold on, let me read my procedure for getting perfectly wrapped up - be right back with you in a few moments”.

James

 

[thomfra]

You really need to get educated on the numbers.

And there is no need for hysteria nor in jumping to false conclusions about 100 different partners a year. The 100 times per year example could be with one or a few partners or 100 different partners having sex one time a year or 2 different partners having sex 50 times per year. Though the population sampling gets skewed statistically based on how its grouped since the underlying statistic assumes a binomial distribution and random sampling. So please use your head a little bit here.

Actually I was being conservative on the numbers. The more typical case is a 12% failure rate. The numbers are about double the failure rate in typical usage of the female version of this condom. If you don’t believe me here is a reference for you. Do your homework.

Of course the condom manufacturer’s want to use the “perfect” numbers using unrealistic laboratory results. In truth no human can sustain perfect levels of usage for long since its simply not natural for a person in the passion of desire to say “hold on, let me read my procedure for getting perfectly wrapped up - be right back with you in a few moments”.

James

Before I get onto the rest of what you have written: What exactly is “the female vesion of a condom” the study referred to?

 

[thomfra]

You really need to get educated on the numbers.

And there is no need for hysteria nor in jumping to false conclusions about 100 different partners a year. The 100 times per year example could be with one or a few partners or 100 different partners having sex one time a year or 2 different partners having sex 50 times per year. Though the population sampling gets skewed statistically based on how its grouped since the underlying statistic assumes a binomial distribution and random sampling. So please use your head a little bit here.

Actually I was being conservative on the numbers. The more typical case is a 12% failure rate. The numbers are about double the failure rate in typical usage of the female version of this condom. If you don’t believe me here is a reference for you. Do your homework.

Of course the condom manufacturer’s want to use the “perfect” numbers using unrealistic laboratory results. In truth no human can sustain perfect levels of usage for long since its simply not natural for a person in the passion of desire to say “hold on, let me read my procedure for getting perfectly wrapped up - be right back with you in a few moments”.

James

**From the World Health Organisation: **

“We are certain that condoms work, particularly among those who change partners often. Experience suggests that it is easier to make sexual contacts safer rather than stop the contacts occurring at all.”

who.int/director-general/speeches/2000/english/20000711_durban.html

Yes: condoms must be used correctly. I looked at this study you referred to.

“Typical condom useage” in the sample they looked at included both “not using it correctly”, as well “only using it some of the time !?!?!?!?” So yeah. Unless we educate people on how to use them then we will not get the same results.

But it’s just not realistic (IMHO) to preach “no sex”.

 

[CentralFLJames]

**From the World Health Organisation: **

“We are certain that condoms work, particularly among those who change partners often. Experience suggests that it is easier to make sexual contacts safer rather than stop the contacts occurring at all.”

who.int/director-general/speeches/2000/english/20000711_durban.html

Yes: condoms must be used correctly. I looked at this study you referred to.

“Typical condom usage” in the sample they looked at included both “not using it correctly”, as well “only using it some of the time !?!?!?!?” So yeah. Unless we educate people on how to use them then we will not get the same results.

But it’s just not realistic (IMHO) to preach “no sex”.

And through what feat of logic and reason are we to conclude that if we can’t teach them that abstinence is the most effective that education on the proper way of using something they lack the wherewithal and the discipline to use is going to work? You are just being selective on what you advocate teaching while admitting that some won’t get a passing grade nor conform to what they have been taught irrespective to what they are taught. It sounds to be like you are advocating declaring giving up on humanity and declaring everyone irredeemably morally bankrupt. Do you really think that a policy of despair that advocates a philosophy of ‘eat, drink and make whoopie for tomorrow we die’ is going to profit the planet or anyone’s soul (ref. Isaiah 22:12-13)?

Besides all that the “typical case” of condom usage is to not use them since they are inconvenient - that is reality. So unless you are now proposing yet another government program to have inspectors or somone certify each person “safe for sex” before they get their free condoms or have somone come out an inspect on site - its all going to degrade to between a 10% and 15% failure rate in practise. Again - this makes my case that its shear insanity to promote a solution that increases the frequency of intercourse. The end result is we will have more pregnancies and more STD’s than ever before in history.

Also, to answer your question there is a female version that is inserted.

James

 

[thomfra]

And through what feat of logic and reason are we to conclude that if we can’t teach them that abstinence is the most effective that education on the proper way of using something they lack the wherewithal and the discipline to use is going to work? You are just being selective on what you advocate teaching while admitting that some won’t get a passing grade nor conform to what they have been taught irrespective to what they are taught. It sounds to be like you are advocating declaring giving up on humanity and declaring everyone irredeemably morally bankrupt. Do you really think that a policy of despair that advocates a philosophy of ‘eat, drink and make whoopie for tomorrow we die’ is going to profit the planet or anyone’s soul (ref. Isaiah 22:12-13)?

Besides all that the “typical case” of condom usage is to not use them since they are inconvenient - that is reality. So unless you are now proposing yet another government program to have inspectors or somone certify each person “safe for sex” before they get their free condoms or have somone come out an inspect on site - its all going to degrade to between a 10% and 15% failure rate in practise. Again - this makes my case that its shear insanity to promote a solution that increases the frequency of intercourse. The end result is we will have more pregnancies and more STD’s than ever before in history.

Also, to answer your question there is a female version that is inserted.

James

Well hang on a second James. One minute you were talking statistics and being all very pragmatic - 12% breakages etc. As soon as you recieve a completely independent source of information from the World Health Organisation you switch back to “the message”…i.e. it would send the message to be morally bankrupt…

My feat of reason (which is really just common sense) just happens to be the same one that the WHO has concluded.

A respected, international health organisation says that condoms (worn by males) stop the spread of STDs such as HIV.

They also say that teaching abstinence will not work. You dispute this based on what?

By the way, I do not deem those of us who chose to have sexual intercourse outside of marriage to be morally bankrupt. They are your words.

 

[CentralFLJames]

By the way, I do not deem those of us who chose to have sexual intercourse outside of marriage to be morally bankrupt. They are your words.

But God does. They are not my words - they are His words. BTW, in case no one has told you, not only is the deed morally bankrupt but so is even the thought of it.

Matthew 5:27-28
27 You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY’; 28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

**1 Corinthians 6:9-11 **
9Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, 10 nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.

James

 

[LilyM]

I am in full favour of the STD testing, I wish there were mobile clinics for STD testing all over, just as there are mobile blood banks and mobile clinics for mammograms (at least here in Oz). And the issue of contraception is really a side issue to the topic of this thread.

The majority of STDs are treatable once discovered, obviously the earlier they are discovered the higher the success rates of treatment. So the sooner and more often they are diagnosed the better for everyone.

 

[Kaninchen]

I am in full favour of the STD testing, I wish there were mobile clinics for STD testing all over, just as there are mobile blood banks and mobile clinics for mammograms (at least here in Oz). And the issue of contraception is really a side issue to the topic of this thread.

The majority of STDs are treatable once discovered, obviously the earlier they are discovered the higher the success rates of treatment. So the sooner and more often they are diagnosed the better for everyone.

I’m bemused by the idea that people could be against STD testing being available on this kind of basis.

 

[LilyM]

I’m bemused by the idea that people could be against STD testing being available on this kind of basis.

I don’t think they are, there’s just this inevitable link of things like this with contraception, as if the two automatically go together and as if people will automatically see STD testing either as licence to fornicate or licence to use contraception if they do.

 

[Kaninchen]

I don’t think they are, there’s just this inevitable link of things like this with contraception, as if the two automatically go together and as if people will automatically see STD testing either as licence to fornicate or licence to use contraception if they do.

I’m afraid that it all rather reminds me of old-fashioned medicine - like the use of ether in childbirth where it was opposed on Biblical grounds (pain in childbirth being women’s punishment for the ‘Sin of Eve’), thankfully for women of the time Victoria had her doctors administer it so it had royal approval!

 

[thomfra]

But God does. They are not my words - they are His words. BTW, in case no one has told you, not only is the deed morally bankrupt but so is even the thought of it.

Matthew 5:27-28
27 You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY’; 28 but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

**1 Corinthians 6:9-11 **
9Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, 10 nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.

James

Oh here we go. **So now you finally show your true colours. Why James, do you bother beginning with “science” and “statistics”, if what you really think is that those who have sex before/outside of marriage are just the worst people on earth? There was a long list of sins there in that passage from Corinthians. Should we leave all such sinners to die?

If you want to argue based soley on catholic morality, then please do so. But be honest about it from the outset.

Bear in mind: What we are talking about here James, is saving millions of people from a terrible death. The church has been preaching chastity for a long time now. Whilst this is a worthy ideal in itself, in the grand scheme of things it has not been a successful method of avoiding the spread of HIV.

The World Health Organistion has found what they believe to be the best way to save millions from dying.

 

[CentralFLJames]

Oh here we go. **So now you finally show your *true ***colours. Why James, do you bother beginning with “science” and “statistics”, if what you really think is that those who have sex before/outside of marriage are just the worst people on earth? There was a long list of sins there in that passage from Corinthians. Should we leave all such sinners to die?

If you want to argue based soley on catholic morality, then please do so. But be honest about it from the outset.

Bear in mind: What we are talking about here James, is saving millions of people from a terrible death. The church has been preaching chastity for a long time now. Whilst this is a worthy ideal in itself, in the grand scheme of things it has not been a successful method of avoiding the spread of HIV.

The World Health Organistion has found what they believe to be the best way to save millions from dying.

Please don’t be absurd and don’t try to place me into a strawman position I don’t hold.

And why try to drive a rhetorical wedge between science and morality? That is just parochial. It is perfectly legitimate to have both a valid scientific and moral basis in one’s belief’s.

You still have not explained the mathematics (nor the morality) behind the philosophy about motivating higher frequency of intimacy and expecting less death and disease rates unless you can prove to me that the higher resultant birth rates offset the death rates. Are you attempting to inject some subtle Machiavellian process variant here?

James