Sad to see that this seems to go on endlessly. At 57 years old I come from the generation that within the gay community was nearly obliterated by HIV infection. I personally between business, relatives and friendship between the mid 1980's and 2000 buried no less than 52 people that I knew from the ravages of HIV infection. In my age group virtually all of these men were by coincidence circumcised. In my generation most were "Chopped" as a routine matter of practice.
I was the one who held the hands, I was the one who gave injections when some of these men were too ill to do it themselves, and I was the one who watched disease in the form of "opportunistic infections" take each and every one of these lives.
Try holding the hands of people you care about and watch a death from "P.M.L" which is a death and opportunistic infection you have to see to believe.
To attribute HIV infection to the presence or lack of a foreskin is irresponsible no matter whom it is that does it.
HIV is transmitted in fact by a very limited set of circumstances. These are based on contact, and introduction into the circulatory system, of living HIV virus. This can be accomplished in the following ways. Oral sex has the ability on a very limited basis to transmit through gum disease of the recipient of seminal fluid and or semen. This is a very "poor" route of transmission, but it can happen in that manner. The most likely method of transmission is caused by being anal receptive and the introduction of the virus takes place via micro-tears in the lining of the anal canal during sex. In vaginal sex, the same thing takes place. The person providing the semen is already an infected individual, and the person receiving the seminal fluids or semen and being receptive is infected when the HIV retrovirus is able to be introduced into the smallest of capillaries in this manner.
Transmission of the virus from the person being anal receptive (bottom) to the (top) takes place when the person doing this has a situation where the blood from the microtears of the receptive individual can enter the urethra and via small microtears or a urethral infection. Manually caused microtears, can be done in sexual foreplay by "exotic activities". (exotic could include "sounding" or other related activities)
Now, if HIV in the civilized world were to be transmitted via the presence of a foreskin the ONLY way that this would be possible would be if the glans of the penis were in some way already injured again providing a pathway for the retrovirus to enter. An example of how to do this would include catching a glans in the zipper of a pair of pants. The same would be true of catching the foreskin itself in a zipper.
In the world of HIV research the words are: "publish or perish" and if you don't publish (good or bad) you do not get grant awards to continue your research. For a scientist, this also means that he and or his family doesn't eat.
When it comes to HIV, the figures have been questionable from the beginning with regards to this retrovirus and it's distribution between heterosexual and homosexual individuals.
In the early years, because of the political stigma, MD's hesitated to use the letters HIV if a heterosexual person was involved. Many years ago, I was personally in the office of a 70-year-old female MD (an associate of my late Stepfather) working on this in Los Angeles. She became so angry at what was going on with the statistics she in a screaming tyrade resigned her position in analysis and went to work tending movie stars old enough to require carbon dating. She told me that she found tons of evidence that was painting a picture that was incorrect. At that time, according to her, if a guy ended up in bed with PCP pneumonia, covered with KS purple and a mouth full of thrush while having a wife and six kids, the MD's often used the words "immune system shutdown" on their diagnosis report. As long as the attending MD's did not use the words "HIV" or "AIDS" in their diagnosis, the statistic was not recorded as HIV. On the other hand, the same MD's when attending a flamboyant gay man would not hesitate to write down "HIV" or "AIDS" when the actual diagnosis came out to be common bacterial pneumonia. By the time the corrected diagnosis was submitted the reports and statistics had already gone to the CDC. It took years for this to change, and it was this kind of action that totally made a mess of the initial disease distribution to the CDC. As this changed, and HIV transmission gained greater understanding, the diagnosis became less a political football and more of a statistic.
In a way, we have the celebrity deaths from this virus to thank for bringing it into the limelight, and taking away at least some of the political "value". Brad Davis, Paul Shenar, Rock Hudson, Lee Liberace, and many others to follow kept the disease process in the limelight. Those losing children to this disease process have included Robert Guillame, Harry Morgan, and Russell Johnson.
Today, in order to cover up the lack of developments on the HIV front, researchers have to sit back and debate the "old issues" over and over again by introducing variables and then repeatedly going after the "what if" we change this or that, what would happen to the transmission models.
Right now, our biggest challenge in removing HIV from the map are those individuals who actually pursue becoming infected, and those who choose to ignore accurate information.
Religion also has to make money. Historically, religion fills a collection plate by "demonizing" something. In the United States, organized religion has worked very diligently to maintain a power base. Coming from a medical family as I have said in the past, I dig very deep to find out who it was that supplied funding for various data studies. Privately funded studies are another way for those employed in medical science to survive. When you have a study funded by a front for some corporate or religious organization, the findings will nearly always reflect more opinion than actual fact.
Everybody can be "bought" for the right price and this includes most scientists.
The exact routes and vectoring of HIV transmission are in fact OLD OLD news. What you see now on this are a bunch of "also rans" spouting more opinion than fact.
The bottom line is the presence or absence of a foreskin is not going to prevent or encourage HIV transmission. What will prevent it is making certain that there is no actual transmission pathway of the virus to the bloodstream. It is that simple! PERIOD!
