In the early days of AIDS (wasn't called HIV back then) the recommendation was to use a condom or dental dam (depending on the hardware of the recipient). That's how I learned what a dental dam was. Later it was suggested that plastic food wrap would work (the jokes just write themselves).
Sadly the ubiquity of paper toilet sheet covers in US bathrooms dates back to the 80s due to straight paranoia over AIDs + widespread and overt anti-gay prejudice, so every time I see one of those dispensers I grit my teeth.
Reminds me of the early days of COVID (not the anti-gay part, but the weird practices when nobody really had yet a good theory of what's going on).
The reason for the reversal in terms is treatment options. When HIV was first found, there were no treatments so AIDS was inevitable. Nowadays, medication can permanently prevent HIV from progressing to AIDS, so AIDS is much less common than HIV.
You might be thinking of “GRID” (gay related immuno deficiency), the original name of AIDS when it was believed it only affects gay people. Once the virus causing the illness was identified it was called HIV.
Preventatively using antibiotics is a horrible idea, for one it increases the risk of creating resisitant strains, and we are already running out of antibiotics (especially broadband ones). Moreover, antibiotics in general are known to mess with you gut biome whose importance we are just beginning to understand (we know it plays a role in many physical and mental illnesses for example). Then there are the side effects which for doxycyline include diarrhea, increased risk of bowel cancer, higher sensitivity to the sun (and associated risk of skin cancer).
If loopdoend’s doing this, it feels like a good bet that there’s a doctor in the mix judging that it’s medically appropriate for them.
Suppose you’re immunocompromised. Wouldn’t it be worth the diarrhea to avoid infections your body couldn’t fight off?
Suppose you’re in a situation where you’re having lots of opportunities for infection. Whether you can or can’t control that situation, the end result is the same: you know your body is going to be challenged by infectious disease frequently in a way that most people’s bodies aren’t. Isn’t it plausible that the infectious agent may have less opportunity to evolve if you didn’t contract it as frequently?
Different forms of therapy might be both individually and collectively optimal for people in different situations. What’s right for a person who isn’t at risk isn’t the same as what’s right for a person who is at risk.
The overuse of antibiotics is mostly in farm animals, which represent 73% of global antibiotics use, and 90% of American antibiotics use.
Personally I’d say that’s a pretty good tradeoff: fear, stigma, and death for a different problem that’s more an annoyance than a mortal threat right now.
Worse still--large scale casual sex is a great way to introduce new, novel and un-contemplated STDs into the population. STDs are opportunistic that way, just ask Mr. triple-resistant Gonorrhea.
It's decidedly not the way I want it to be, but that's just how it works. For casual sex to be safe I think its more like "Hi, please spit into this tube so we can get busy" and red means HIV, Green means Monkeypox, comprehensively.
Actually it appears the 9-polyvalent HPV vaccine protects against multiple cancers but insurance won't pay for it once your outside the age window.
* originally he said "throat cancer" at the advice of his agent!
[edited: wityl pointed out I’d typed HSV for some reason]
There is no vaccine, it doesn't cause cancer (that we know of, at least not like HPV), and spreads via skin contact on the genital area.
Since fluids are not required for HPV or HSV and it's present on the area that a condom won't cover, condoms aren't effective for either.
See also: Wrestlers' "Herpes gladiatorum" which is just HSV-1. Which demonstrates how HSV-1 survives for transmission far more easily or broadly than just genital contact. Is there "HSV-2 gladiatorum"? Apparently it's usually HSV-1 but probably yes - neither HSV-1 or HSV-2 are really location specific.
This is how you end up with super STD's
lol what
https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/risk/condoms.html "condoms are highly effective in preventing HIV"
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9141163/ 1997, "reexamination of HIV seroconversion studies suggests that condoms are 90 to 95% effective when used consistently"
https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/prevention/condoms.html "Most condoms are effective in preventing HIV and certain other STIs"
https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/risk/prep/index.html
>PrEP reduces the risk of getting HIV from sex by about 99%.
Last I checked 99 was greater than 95.
Preventative:
1. Gardasil 9 (vaccine against 9 strains of HPV, prevents genital warts and cancers caused by HPV)
2. Monkeypox vaccine
3. Meningitis ACYW vax
4. Meningitis B vax (35% effective against gonorrhea)
5. doxyPEP (two pills of doxycycline taken after sex, 90% effective against syphilis, 80% chlamydia, 50% gonorrhea)
6. PrEP (prevents HIV infections)
7. and the usual suite of vaccines against the rest like hepatitis A/B, mumps etc
Treatment of the bacterial ones (which transmit through oral too):
1. syphilis - butt shot of penicillin 2. chlamydia - 1 pill of an antibiotic 3. gonorrhea - a week of doxycycline pills or one butt shot of ceftriaxone
Remaining: HSV. Half of the population has it, so no big deal. Condoms dont prevent it either.
As for hepatitis: even though it requires blood contact and as such is not necessarily considered an STI, hepatitis c is curable these days thanks to DAAs taken over the course of 8-12 weeks. a/b have vaccines.