Archives of Sexual Behavior, 24:4, 1995, p383
The authors conclude that "intravenous and anal activities remain
the only clear vectors for HIV transmission." You will recall the
half dozen studies quantifying the vaginal transmissability of HIV
positiveness. They each put the figure at between 1/500 and 1/1,500.
These figures are arrived at by studying "discordant" couples:
male HIV-pos, female HIV-neg with the only means of transmission assumed
to be unprotected vaginal intercourse (the females all claim to
not inject drugs). The ASB report concludes assumes that some of
these women are lying about their drug injection statues, and that
some of them engage in anal intercourse. Once these two factors are
figured in, there is no excess "seroconversion" attributable only
to vaginal intercourse. Thus thier conclusion that there is no
evidence for vaginal transmission.
Eleopulos claims that HIV positiveness merely indicates the
presense of antibodies stimulated by either:
1) non-HIV germs that "cross react" with the five protiens assumed
to be part of HIV, or
2) exposure to other people's blood via shared needles, receptive
anal intercourse, or injection with whole blood or blood products.
This theory predicts that only some *portion* of people exposed to
these factors will produce detectable amounts of one or more of the
antibodies that react with the five protiens associated with "HIV."
--Paul Philpott
Reappraising AIDS Newsletter
©COPYRIGHT, AIDS Authority; reprinted with permission