AIDS and the churches: getting the story right.

First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life, April, 2008 by Green, Edward C.; Ruark, Allison Herling

Responses to the global HIV/AIDS epidemic are often driven not by evidence but by ideology, stereotypes, and false assumptions. Referring to the hyperepidemics of Africa, an article in The Lancet this fall named "ten myths" that impede prevention efforts-including "Poverty and discrimination are the problem," "Condoms are the answer," and "Sexual behavior will not change." Yet such myths are held as self-evident truths by many in the AIDS establishment. And they result in efforts that are at best ineffective and at worst harmful, while the AIDS epidemic continues to spread and exact a devastating toll in human lives.

Consider this fact: In every African country in which HIV infections have declined, this decline has been associated with a decrease in the...

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