The PRO-CONDOM A.M.A. PRESIDENT SPEAKS

WMCA - New York ^ | 12.9.2004

[KMC1]

Even though he knew what he was in for the President of the AMA did wander into the Kevin McCullough Show today. I tried to remain polite - but his position - opposing abstinence in federal funding initiatives is just foolish. Nonetheless I have to give incoming AMA President J. Edward Hill props he stood and faced the music - read for yourself...

KMC: Dr. Hill, welcome to the Kevin McCullough Show...

Hill: Thank you very much Kevin.

KMC: Let me ask you, from Tupulo Mississippi to the head of the AMA - that's quite a rise wouldn't you say?

Hill: Well actually it's a much bigger rise than that. I spent a bunch of years in what's called the Mississippi Delta which is the impovrished part of our state, then to Tupulo which is a very progressive part of our state, and then to this position...it wasn't by design Kevin, it just happened.

KMC: Let me ask you this Dr. Hill...Your organization issued a couple of resolutions the other day regarding abstinence education and I am curious to know why is it that the American Medical Association, what is it that they have against Abstinence Educators?

Hill: Absolutely nothing against Abstinence Educators or abstinence education. We have long held and worked out policy over the years endorsing "comprehensive family life education"...

KMC: But what is "comprehensive family life" what is that a reference to?

Hill:Well its in reference to Comprehensive School Health Education which is one part of comprehensive school health... but this policy's old its not new relative to abstinence only education. Unless research shows us that abstinence only education is superior in outcomes to any other kind of education. There is a lot, some misunderstanding about our resolve at our recent meeting this week...

KMC: Okay well let me ask you this then because I don't want to give you false information...The Congressman Waxman report that came out the week before your resolutions did...did you find yourself in agreement with Congressman Waxman or opposing his viewpoint in that report?

Hill: Well, not entirely agreeing with him and not entirely opposing him...if you look at our resolutions it says that we support "promoting abstinence as the best method to prevent teen-age prenancy and sexually transmitted diseases" and then we add, "while also discussing the roles of condoms and birth control as endorsed by the school systems."

KMC: But Dr. Hill isn't fair to say that abstinence until marriage is the only, 100% effective method of preventing teen-age pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases?

Hill: Absolutely correct...

KMC: Well, if we are saying that teen-age pregnancy is bad, and STD's are bad why would we want to even open the door to other alternatives for kids who are seeking the educational environment to give them the truth on the matter?

Hill: When you say "open the door", the door is wide open and has been for sometime. What we want to base our programs on will be a support, whether they work or not, not on the structure of whatever the orientation is...

KMC: So what are the teen (birth) rates like over the past three and half years since most of these abstinence programs got going?

Hill: Well the evidence is, uh, I don't think, uh, uh,

KMC: I'm not asking you what you think. I'm asking you what the rates are because I know in the state of Illinois for example that teen pregnancy and birth rates are at 40 year lows and lows that they've never seen, and the Governor has said that it was because of the abstinence education programs that people were applying to the situation...

Hill: That's what he said. But we don't know the science behind what's caused the teenage pregnancy rates to go down. We are extremely pleased that they have gone down, and I suspect, very likely, its multiple uh programs, and multiple strategies...

KMC: How important in your programs, because you guys are saying that you are not supporting any federal funding unless its a comprehensive sex education program unless, unless, they can prove that they're successful...what will it take for you to be satisfied that a program is successful.

Hill: Well again, scientific evidence that it works...

KMC: Would ten different studies settle it for you, if there were ten different scientific studies that said...

Hill: If they were well done studies, if they were not flawed, if they were peer reviewed, uh...

KMC: Would the Northwestern University study hold up under that criteria?

Hill: No institution will necessarily hold up, fine institutions sometime produce flawed reports, so you have to be evaluated...by...

KMC: So what I'm trying to get at is - What is the objective standard that makes a study hold up?

Hill:Well whether it works or not...whether it uh...

KMC: But, but...the results that you want? Okay so what are the results that you would like to see?

Hill: Well what we would like to see is no teenage pregnancy out of wedlock, what we would like to see is no sexually transmitted diseases uh in teenagers for that matter in anybody...that's what we would like to see.

KMC:But Dr. Hill what I'm seeing here and I've followed this issue pretty closely and studied for a long time and have been doing it on this show for a long time...but I guess my frustration here is that in thelast three years there are specific numbers that you can point to, in many different states where the teen birth rates and the STD rates are coming down, some of them at record lows...the only difference that has occurred, because the "comprehensive sex education" programs that you are touting in your resolutions were in existence long before the abstinence programs...so if you're not going to get 100% success isn't better to move dynamically towards the direction of that success?

Hill: Which is exactly what our resolutions say...

KMC: But I think that by opening the door to the condom option is reverting back to failed methods from the past - I'll give you the last word.

Hill: The last year is I have practiced for thirty years in a very impoverished area where programs that promote condom use and sex education have more impact than the place where I am practicing now, which is much more open to abstinence only programs...so its determined by the environment and the venue where you are trying to reach teens.

So the bottom line for Dr. Hill is - poor kids are too stupid to understand abstinence so giving them condoms (and exposing them to both pregnancy and STDs at the same time) is the only thing that can be done to reduce teen pregnancy and STDs.

Does that make any sense?

This is an excerpt, to read more  click here...

[Spirited]

What's his word worth? He's only another Union leader.

[Texas Eagle]

...and then we add, "while also discussing the roles of condoms and birth control as endorsed by the school systems."

Does the school system endorse the failure rate of condoms?

[Gondring]

Well, it might help a bit if they would publicize what the CDC admits...there are sexually transmissible agents out there that are NOT stopped by condoms (and I'm not even talking about the debatable ones...I'm talking about ones that the CDC admits are not stopped by condoms) and kill THOUSANDS of American women each year.

According to the CDC, HPV infection is believed to be required for cervical cancer to occur, and most of these teens aren't taught at all about HPV, because condoms don't stop it*, and that goes against the party line of promoting condoms. So they have the blood of thousands of women on their hands and they don't care.

This approach is sickening, even if there's ongoing promising research regarding a vaccine to prevent some of the infections.

*From Centers for Disease Control Genital HPV Infection Fact Sheet: HPV infection can occur in both male and female genital areas that are covered or protected by a latex condom, as well as in areas that are not covered.

[joesnuffy]

Sounds allot like a typical conversation between Satan and his nephew Wormwood... as the old devil tries to imbue his nephew with the fine art of incrementalism...