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Clancy....stats can be read anyway one wants too, but the bare naked truth is just about the surest way to get HIV is to have anal sex with someone who has it, or to use the same needle as someone who has it...

anal sex is an unnatural sexual act; the rectal area is not supposed to be assaulted like that day in and day out, and there is an ample supply of blood vessels there that can not take that abuse...(unlike the plain old vagina that also doubles as a birth canal)

I would just take a good guess that there are very few HIV cases truely transferred by wholely hetero partners who have no IV drug abuse in their past....

instead, I think we are seeing drug abuser couples getting the virus from shared needles, then passing it along that way....

It does not matter how many get it from anal sex, gays, drug users or wherever. The facts are that the disease does spread by contact with bodily fluids.

This is the reason all dentists now wear protective masks, many surgeons wear extreme protective equipment during surgery.

My points are:

1. Gays are people too and are entitled to health care no matter how a disease is contracted. All the sexually transmitted diseases are treated - why an exception to Aids? (I don't need an answer please - I've heard enough of the "let em die" type answers).

2. Just wishing that people will change their behavior has never solved any problems because we live in a morally freer climate. How many out-of-wedlock babies are there? How many jails to hold criminals we were unable to convince to live a crime free life? How many treatment centers to try and cure drug and alcoholic addicts? Have we solved the drug problem? Why not?

People will make their own decisions about what they do. We have weak people, strong people, stupid people. You get the message - people are different.

3. Lastly - I know full well how a lot of Aids is spread - I am not an idiot. I also know full well that nurses have caught the disease from a pinprick in treating a patient. I know that a major sports figure had to retire from sports because he was HIV positive and was a danger to his teammates. I can name hundreds of instances of aids being caught by those not involved with anal sex or gay relationships.

4. The disease in our society will infect more and more of our young people, more and more "innocents", more and more heterosexuals.

All treatment professions have had to change procedures to insure protection of care givers because the disease can be transmitted when they treat a patient coming in contact with blood or bodily fluids. The fluid splashed into their eyes, mouth, or into a cut will cause the disease in them. Many patients do not even know they have the disease so these professions treat people as if all have the disease. An exposed male can unknowingly transmit the disease to his wife. His wife can transmit the disease to an unborn child. On and on.

So, we treat the disease in all patients in our society to prevent the spread throughout our whole society.

Now - call me ignorant but don't bother to try and teach me about this disease. Apparently I know a good deal more than many on here as they think this is only a problem among gays and if they choose to act foolishly, by dang, we are not going to pay for research to get rid of the disease. Meanwhile, their teenagers are exposed daily through sports, through our free sex society and the many sexual partners who might have somewhere come in contact with the disease and unknowingly be HIV positive.

Of course, we can teach our children not to get involved with sex until marriage, we can analyze the problem with the gay lifestyle and make them quit having sex, we can make HIV positive people remain celibate or only have sex with other HIV positive people, we can put in place tests for all citizens to quickly identify those who have become HIV positive and publicize the names of the positives so everyone will stay away from them.

Seems a little risky to me. Maybe we ought to spend our efforts in finding cures.