Many people, including the head of the WHO’s HIV division Kevin de Cock, have observed that “we can’t treat our way out of this epidemic”. Today, The Lancet publishes a paper by many people, including the head of the WHO’s HIV division Kevin de Cock, claiming that we can, in fact, treat our way out [...]
HIV research nerds like myself collect information from people at risk because we want to make things better for those people (by providing better prevention services, e.g.), not because we want to make things worse. But what happens when that information gets used as a weapon against the very people we want to help? It’s [...]
Since the Swiss noted that people who take their meds correctly and don’t have other infections are unlikely to pass on HIV, the public health establishment has been in a tizz over how to react. Predictably enough, Australian researchers have done what epidemiologists with a point to make so often do: — they’ve reached for [...]
I’ve been known to take the piss out of scientists who think people make decisions about sex the way they make decisions about what stocks to invest in, nice and rationally. My published references even include “Sex is fun, remember?”. In my experience, a hard-on (or its female equivalent, a wide-on) tends to disrupt rational [...]
Last week, Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche said it was giving up on HIV-related research. I expected some cynical “told you so” comments from industry analysts, but the reaction to the announcement was surprisingly muted. Even AIDS activists were mousy. Activists have done a spectacular job in slapping down the price of antiretroviral drugs in the [...]
Last week I posted the patented Wisdom of Whores Automatic Proposal Generator (TM) to help you all shake millions out of the Global Fund. But today I found a tool thats is genuinely useful from the ever-helpful Kaiser Family Foundation They’ve put together a fanatstic, really simple tool that allows you to generate charts of [...]
The Global Fund has announced an extra round of funding for 2008. Intimidated by the 68-pages of instructions? Don’t be. The Wisdom of Whores Automatic Proposal Generator (TM) is here to help. Just press the “Give me money!” button as often as you need to, and copy the phrases into your Global Fund proposal. You [...]
It’s been a busy day on the airwaves. Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking, I managed to hit BBC World TV’s HardTalk interview and be on BBC Radio 4′s Start the Week, both in one day. On HardTalk, Stephen Sackur spent a lot of time quizzing me about my mafia connections. Comments have ranged [...]
Apologies for the silence, which was in part due to a glorious whirlwind of a visit to Dublin, where I spent a while with Ireland’s answer to Oprah, Gerry Ryan. I’ve always been a bit of a fan of Gerry’s morning show on RTE2 so I know that pretty much anything goes. And I was [...]
I’ve been a bit distracted of late by the impending launch of The Wisdom of Whores. Now I’m distracted by the post-party haze, and this shelf at Blackwell’s is completely bare. But I promise to be back on sex, science and all things sundry in the next day or two. Thanks to everyone who came [...]
I promise not to keep posting reviews of The Wisdom of Whores to this blog. There’s a whole page dedicated to reviews (“What They’re Saying”) over here, and if any readers want to contribute their own views I’ll post them there. Even if you hate the book. But since it’s an idle Sunday and I’m [...]
The first review of The Wisdom of Whores hit the newsstands yesterday, in London’s Evening Standard. I was honoured that fab World of Boy novelist Will Self read the book, and thrilled that he reviewed it with his penis. (Well, he reviewed it with his brain. But he reviewed it together with his penis, which [...]
A fashion designer turned massage parlour owner in Indonesia has come up with an inspired solution to the problem of unsafe sex: he’s padlocking his girls in to their trousers. Paul Watson of the LA Times spoke to Franky Setiawan, owner of Doghado Massage Parlor, who came up with the chastity pants. Setiawan “says he [...]
This video, not to be taken tooooo seriously (though the science is spot on), is the product of a rainy afternoon with the incomparable Candy Gourlay. Check out Candy’s wit, wisdom and illustration at Notes From the Slushpile
Fundamentalist Catholics seem determined to save souls without saving lives. But the elected representatives of the American should not be following suit. Today, the US House of Representatives discusses a bill that will take US$ 50 billion out of taxpayers’ pockets and put it on the table for HIV treatment for people in poor countries. [...]
I’m not easily shocked. Really. But I have to say that the hairs rose on the back on my neck when I saw this: A catholic NGO, calling itself Human Life International, has put up three of these billboards in Tanzania. It’s president, Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer, crows about this achievement on a Catholic web [...]
Some readers may have had yesterday’s literary post zoned out by the language police. By happy coincidence, Blog Around the Clock drew my attention to the cuss-o-meter, and I ran The Wisdom through it. Just 16.6% of my posts are grubby, which shows there’s lot more science than sex on this blog. I note, though, [...]
This morning The Guardian published an opinion piece (Sptizer’s True Folly), in which I argued that we should promote laws which differentiate between the exchange of sex for money between consenting adults and the exploitation of children and unwilling workers. Here was one of the responses, from kathyw: Oh, please. These women (and the transgendered [...]
So New York’s Democrat governor Elliot Spitzer admits to having been a naughty boy. He wanted to have sex with someone who wasn’t his wife, and pay for it. Tut tut. Paroxysms of delight from his enemies at The Wall Street Journal and comment about Spitzer’s staying power and other analysis many other places besides. [...]
