The myth of heterosexual HIV

I am not a fan of Charlie Sheen neither well acquainted with his movies and sit-coms. I do like him though since he admitted using the services of the infamous Hollywood Madam Heidi Fleiss. Especially in America, where prostitution is illegal, it takes balls to admit as a public figure that you frequent escorts. As far as I know, he was the only celebrity to admit having been a naughty boy.

When news broke that he was HIV-positive, some people immediately blamed it on his promiscuous life-style. I am not so sure since it is really difficult to contract the virus as a heterosexual guy. I presume Charlie might have taken a walk on the wild side and that´s how he got it.

Recently, I got tested for HIV at a famous Berlin hospital and as expected, the result was negative. I just mention this since it was the first doctor who confirmed me that it is indeed really difficult to contract HIV if you are a straight man. He told me the chance for a male to become infected from vaginal intercourse was around 1/2000. Nowadays it´s also not a death-sentence any more but rather a chronic disease where you have to take your daily medication rigorously.

In the beginning of the epidemic though, there were people committing suicide by jumping out of the window upon hearing the test result. Needless to say, the clinic moved their premises from the third floor to the ground floor. Also, whole families were exterminated with partners infecting one another. There was a girl who got contaminated by her first boyfriend. Eight years before they met, he’d sporadically injected drugs…

Years ago, I asked two doctors at HIV-clinics if it was true that it was really difficult for hetero-sexuals to catch HIV. Also, how about the odds of getting HIV trough intercourse and they were both reluctant to discuss it. In 1998 it was already clear though that HIV wasn’t going to rage in the general population but would be restricted to high-risk groups, mainly to intravenous drug users and gay people.

Instead of being treated as an STD, “Aids” was turned into a moral crusade. The state tried to police people´s sexual lives. The same will happen again with the soon-to-come prostitution laws, where the girls will have to register as a prostitute in the near future. Another reason for this public health scare, was the fact that a lot of jobs depended on letting the public believe they were at risk. Think of it as the “Aids” industry.

Finally, there was political correctness. In order not to stigmatize the homosexual community, everybody should be equally at risk. Last night, when I walked home, I was exposed to a poster of the German Aids-relief Association picturing a woman of at least 60 years…