From: Steve Harris <sbharris@ix.netcom.com>
Newsgroups: misc.kids.pregnancy,misc.health.alternative,sci.med
Subject: Re: MDs forcing kids to take poison
Date: 7 Aug 2005 13:17:57 -0700
Message-ID: <1123445877.289821.207470@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>

PF Riley wrote:
> By the way, thanks to near-universal HIV prenatal testing along with
> antepartum and postpartum AZT, congenital HIV is now almost unheard
> of.

COMMENT:

In the US.  In other countries, notably Africa, it's not true. Partly
due to stupidity (they have some wacko Germans telling them that HIV is
harmless, and some in the government are listening) and partly due to
poverty, and partly due to more than a decade of REALLY dumb delays in
how the vertical transmission drug prevention trials were run (since
transmission occurs at birth, it really only makes sense to knock viral
levels down JUST before birth, and cheaply give drug no longer than it
takes to do that, but--- duh-- nobody thought of doing that for YEARS).

That said, this is not the best argument for circumcision. If a kid
wants it at puberty as an adjunct HIV preventive, let him opt for the
surgery then, the same way he would for a nose job or orthodontics. Why
make irreversible and major decisions for people when you don't have
to, and can wait till they are capable of participating?  This isn't
like giving childhood vaccines.

BTW, the universal hep B vac program seems to be working. I'll be glad
to see that disease as a thing of the past. Now where's the dang hep C
vaccine?

And if the cat FIV vaccine really works at all, why are they taking so
long for people?  Inquiring minds want to know.

SBH