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Feminism: Sex & gender discussions

Already the HIV anti vac is being compared to the contraceptive pill.

27 replies

Dutchcourage · 03/08/2016 11:14

In regards to the NHS funding it.

I had an irate male on my facebook stating we should stop the free contraceptive pill also

There have been a couple of posts on here saying that it was a fair comparison.

Why does it always have to boil down to if men can't have it why should women. The pill was not made for unprotected sex. It was to protect married women from being chained to the kitchen sink in the 60s so they could actually have a life/work with a child clinging to her. Nothing to do with being able to have sex with new partners unprotected.

It also cost the NHS a snipet of what the HIV anti vac costs.

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Dutchcourage · 03/08/2016 11:17

It also gave married women the chance to manage her own sexusl contraceptive with out having to rely on the bloke to by condoms or the use the dreaded withdrawal method. Angry

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SpeakNoWords · 03/08/2016 11:40

Can the HIV anti vac be used by women as well as men? Or is it something that only works for men?

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Xenophile · 03/08/2016 11:42

Ah yes, the old "lifestyle choice" chestnut.

Such utter bollocks

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Dutchcourage · 03/08/2016 11:44

speak I'm not sure but it would be amazing it if could as there is a huge epidemic in Africa - where women really do not have a choice. Also 91% of children with AIDS/HIV are there.

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T1mum3 · 03/08/2016 11:55

Dutchcourage - that's a good point. I've been thinking of it in terms of the fact that there is treatment, post-contact prophylactic, and of course barrier/abstinence methods of prevention in the developed world, so money could have been better spent elsewhere e.g. on research into prevention, better treatment or cure of my son's condition which in woefully underfunded but has a much more intensive and onerous treatment than HIV, and a marginally worse prognosis in the Western world.

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SpeakNoWords · 03/08/2016 11:55

So from what I've read online it is a treatment for anyone with a high risk of acquiring HIV. So I really don't see the comparison with the pill, or what the point of a comparison would be.

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Hagothehills · 03/08/2016 12:01

The contraceptive pill was originally developed to help manage especially heavy/ painful periods. Some women (including myself) still take it for this reason and this reason alone. I started taking it when I was 12. Clearly not to be promiscuous but so I lead a normal life. The contraceptive side was discovered as a positive side effect. So I really don't think the comparison is a just one in the slightest.

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Dutchcourage · 03/08/2016 12:12

hagonthehills I'm not sure it was solely made for periods as I've just read the history of the CP and it was quite a race to develop a hormonal contraceptive in the 50s which predates my original thoughts of it being a 60s thing! Although its ability to manage periods is a very valuable entity.

speak there is no comparison and I'm struggling to articulate way. It's almost as if the minute a a tablet which is going to be available to predominantly men for unprotected sex is put under the spot light the emphasis is then put back on something women have been using for decades, something that enabled women to get out of the house and change the status quo and not for unprotected sex either.

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OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 03/08/2016 12:13

My rage has mostly been peaked by men saying well if you get HIV you can die but there's no risk with not taking contraceptives.

I feel like linking to maternal and infant mortality rates in countries without contraception. That's before I start educating people on the very real issue of birth injuries...

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VestalVirgin · 03/08/2016 12:28

Men who have unprotected sex with women who take the pill should have to pay for the pill. Taxes is the easiest way of ensuring they pay, but of course, we could also ask all women to demand that the men they have casual sex with pay up for one month of taking the pill, as that's about the length of time that's needed to establish the pregnancy prevention needed for one time PIV sex.

Men who complain about the pill being funded by the NHS don't really want women to stop using the pill. (Perhaps it is somewhat like Brexit that way?). Because that would mean they don't get to have unprotected sex with women anymore, and I am sure most of the complainers wouldn't want that.

(Of course, strict abortion laws were only established in the US after the pill became available - if we outlawed the pill, that might force male-dominated governments to legalize abortion, as men would become increasingly frustrated by women's unwillingness to engage in the sexual acts they know lead to unwanted pregnancy.)


The people who are treated unfairly by the pill being paid for by the NHS are women like me, a small number of gay men, and the few men who actually prefer to use condoms or are celibate.
I'm pretty sure that except the men who are celibate for religious reasons, none of those groups is the most vocal in complaining. (It miiight be gay men complaining about the HIV anti vac not being funded, but experience leads me to suspect it's not; gay men gain nothing if the pill isn't funded anymore, but there are a lot of heterosexual men who don't care shit about gay men but want to hurt women.)

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VestalVirgin · 03/08/2016 12:31

My rage has mostly been peaked by men saying well if you get HIV you can die but there's no risk with not taking contraceptives.

I am against forced sterilization in principle, but confronted with such assholes males, I am sorely tempted to change my opinion ... if they choose not to be aware of the risk, they should not be able to inflict it on any woman.

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NeedAScarfForMyGiraffe · 03/08/2016 12:31

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

slug · 03/08/2016 13:11

DH, who works i the field, was talking about this last night. Apparently you cannot, legally, do any trials with the drug without also strongly recommending the use of condoms as well. (because what happens if the drug fails?) So, while the reduction in the rates of infection appear to be huge, this cannot be unlinked from the possible increase in condom use as well. Without wanting to unravel the statistics behind it, his belief is the baseline reduction infection is not particularly high, or "borderline" was his comment.

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OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 03/08/2016 13:17

NeedAScarf My understanding is that the pill has a 90% success rate which means that if you are knowingly having sex with a HIV + partner you will still need to use condoms because of the high cost of failure.

I'd be very interested in knowing what the comparative failure rates are for homosexual relationships, versus heterosexual relationship (and the two types of transmission within). I know that women are more at risk of catching HIV from partners so imagine failure rates are greater in those cases.

Also, there is a big difference between someone using a "just in case" pill having a 10% failure rate when e.g. only 10% of their sexual contact is with a HIV infected person, and someone using them because they only have sexual contact with a HIV infected person.

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OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 03/08/2016 13:17

Cross posted there with slug who explained the risks better than me.

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VestalVirgin · 03/08/2016 14:27

I'd be very interested in knowing what the comparative failure rates are for homosexual relationships, versus heterosexual relationship (and the two types of transmission within). I know that women are more at risk of catching HIV from partners so imagine failure rates are greater in those cases.

Men are more at risk of transmitting HIV to partners during penetration. I don't think that's dependent on the sex of the partner; but anal sex is more dangerous, and gay couples are still more likely to engage in that (although apparently it becomes more and more common for heterosexual couples, too)

Also, there is a big difference between someone using a "just in case" pill having a 10% failure rate when e.g. only 10% of their sexual contact is with a HIV infected person, and someone using them because they only have sexual contact with a HIV infected person.

Indeed. A pill for people whose partner has tested positive being paid for by the NHS would be perfectly justifiable.
It being paid for by the NHS without any questions asked would be expensive, as everyone (well, everyone who cares about their health) would take it just to be on the safe side.

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Dutchcourage · 03/08/2016 14:29

vestal it was a gay male friend of mine who was complaining last night that maybe we should stop getting the pill on NHS if the HIV vac is denied on NHS.

oneflew so basically you still need to wear a condom anyway - which leads me to think if you will take the risk of unprotected sex any way that 10 % is going to be risked??

it was only in 1991 that rape with in a marrage was made illigal, the CP is so much more than protecting against unwanted consequences.

Also there was a lady in the other thread who actually had HIV and said she wouldn't expect her Dh to take a life long pill to make it safer - when there is still a risk anyway (10%)

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Buunychops · 03/08/2016 14:38

Thanks Slug for that bit of info, I was wondering as virtually all clinical study's have a 'must use contraception' clause.

I was going to have a dig to see but that all makes sense.

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OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 03/08/2016 15:09

Actually Vestal, I was thinking of the flip side of that - in that if you've got a 10% chance with 10% of partners then taking the pill reduces your hypothetical risk from 10% to 1% which may be considered an acceptable risk for some people.

But for someone only having sex with a HIV+ partner, a 10% risk is really quite high. If that's a 10% risk each time you have sex (need to read the study more closely) then chances are you will be infected within a year which is most certainly not an improvement on using a condom.

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OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 03/08/2016 15:10

Although of course I imagine those couples would still use condoms and the PrEP pill as a belts and braces approach which would make a lot of sense.

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VestalVirgin · 03/08/2016 15:33

Although of course I imagine those couples would still use condoms and the PrEP pill as a belts and braces approach which would make a lot of sense.

Yes, I imagine that would be the way it is used.

Considering acceptable risks, sex with random strangers wouldn't be worth a 1% risk to me, while sex with a beloved spouse might be worth the 1% risk that remains with medication AND condoms.

@Dutchcourage: Has he ever considered that women can get HIV, too, so it is totally fair? Both women and he get to have sex with no risk of getting pregnant, but some risk of catching HIV.

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Dervel · 03/08/2016 16:53

I understand your frustration. Linking prep and contraceptive pills is a non-sequitor.

I'd be inclined to trust the NHS to use its resources wisely. If we want a greater range of treatments we should ALL expect to pay more tax.

The moment we start a public discourse about what treatments are or are not worthy we may as well be making the argument to privatise healthcare (which I fear may be the point, divide and conquer and all that).

My fear with prep, and it's great something like this exists, is its not the only std in the streets. There are still tonnes of nasty things out there it is worthwhile being wise about.

I'm afraid of this attack on women's healthcare.

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Hrumphing · 03/08/2016 20:15

I think it will only be for particular high risk individuals - gay men in high risk groups being one, women trying to get pregnant with a HIV pos partner might be another. The analogy between the pill and PReP is ridiculous. One is a cheap medication of benefit to millions and millions with a low number needed to treat preventing millions of unwanted pregnancies and massively umproving the autonomy of women. The other is an expensive treatment targeted at only a few 10s of 1000s of individuals - though may still be something very valuable we should also fund depending on cost benefit analysis.
This study has some data on the effectiveness of PReP in gay men. The number of seroconversions in the placebo group over the treatment group were 28 in over 3200 person years - www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1011205#results

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JacquettaWoodville · 05/08/2016 12:04

Eh?

Funding contraceptives surely saves taxpayer money vs abortion/adoption costs?

Is it still possible to get free condoms from FPCs? Does that apply to gay couples too?

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Kallyno · 08/08/2016 22:21

Slug, that is easily controlled for with a placebo group! That is very basic research methodology.

The NHS is all about cost effective public healthcare. While PReP is expensive, treatment and care of a person with HIV is very expensive. HIV infection rates are actually on the rise again. PReP offers a chance to get ahead of this and close it down.

The analogy drawn with the pill is too flawed to be worthwhile but I think the point being made is that this is a potential game changer. People who talk about condom use etc make a good point but fail to understand how people actually make decisions when they matter. For example, when I eat my breakfast I might plan to only have a couple of drinks when I go out that night because I am on a diet; however, later that night I find myself 6 drinks down and heading for a kebab. Intentions and behaviours do not always match up.

While gay men who don't practice safe sex are the most vulnerable group in terms of HIV transmission they are not the only group who could benefit from this, including groups of vulnerable women.

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