Friday, September 28, 2007

It's the first time I've heard this...

Condoms in Africa is an issue everyone has an opinion on, and thankfully there are pretty much only two opinions at that. Either you support the spread of condoms in African to help prevent HIV infection, or you don't; it's all rather simple. What you rarely hear is any grand conspiratorial rant that suggests European condom producers are intentionally infected condoms with HIV. And when you do hear something like that, which you have to admit, even if you are opposed to the 'condom solution', you're more likely to hear it expressed on a message board by a teen-age fundamentalist. But no, the first person to make this claim just happened to be the Archbishop of the Catholic Church in Mozambique. Awesome.

Gerald of The Cafeteria is Closed tells us that Archbishop Francisco Chimoio recently informed the press that he was aware of at least two condom producers who were infecting their product. Chimoio noticeably does not name a manufacturer, but nevertheless stands by his claim. Now although I don't really think a company would stoop to this, it isn't entirely plausible if you approach the claim from a financial perspective: The more African that have AIDS/HIV, the more condoms the UN will purchase to import to Africa, and the more money condom makers earn.

We'll see how this story develops.

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