This report from the Center for Health and Gender Equity actually came out in April, but it just appeared in my Google Alerts today. The report argues that the US government - still one of the world's largest providers of condoms through foreign aid - should send more female condoms. They are currently 2% of US condom buys. The Center wants this percentage to be increased so that there can be a serious effort to market female condoms and get more people using them.
The idea is that female condoms allow women to protect themselves and their partners from STIs without having to convince a many to wear a condom. It makes sense for cultures where conversations about sex are highly taboo, I guess. I still have to wonder if men in these relationships (whether transactional or romantic) don't still have enough power to demand no condom use at all.
This is getting into a very technical area, and I’m not going to pretend to be an expert. But I think it is a legitimate question if the female condom is just a bad product that people won't use, or if it needs to be marketed better. Few people like female condoms, but it isn't as if regular condoms are universally popular - so customer satisfaction is clearly not the only important factor. If the female condom wasn't so weird and alien, maybe it would be used more. But what percentage of our foreign aid needs to be spent on priming the female condom supply, versus ensuring a sufficient supply of the product that people already know?
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You’re right to question the product features of female condoms as well as whether they’re a worthy investment of U.S. funds. I encourage you to read the report and refer to this blog http://www.alternet.org/sex/84057/ for more answers to your questions. The fact is that female condoms are the only currently available HIV prevention method designed for women to initiate. This product will not be the preferred product of all women or their partners, nor will all women be able to negotiate its use. However, for some women, female condoms will mean the difference between being able to engage in protected sex or risking unintended pregnancy or HIV infection. Studies have demonstrated that making female condoms available in settings where male condoms are also available increases the number of protected sex acts indicating that adding female condoms to the market has an added public health benefit. Male and female condoms are very different products and some users prefer one over the other or like to alternate their use. Suggesting that the U.S. should not invest in female condoms because male condoms are already available denies individuals the right to critical health information and access to a product that could save their lives. As you said yourself, male condoms are not universally accepted. Why wouldn't we invest in making more prevention options available so that individuals can choose the best method for protecting themselves given their unique life circumstances, thereby preserving the health of individuals and strengthening communities?
Thanks for commenting and for the link. I agree with most of what you say.
Where we disagree is that I don't see how the US not investing in female condoms denies anyone critical health information? It makes one product more difficult to access (not impossible, just more difficult. The US is far from the only player here) but the information about it doesn't have to be linked to the product itself, does it?
I know that public health best practice is to link access and information, but the fact that they aren't necessarily connected is why we have that mantra in the first place.
Surely there's room to give 2 options, one for each gender to control, in the fight for world health and population control. Why not? Why would one argue otherwise? It's convenient that the most popular method for protection is the one in control by the man, so there's obvious bias. But why should the male safety zone be so preserved, or for that matter, get all of the prevention products from developed nations? Surely women are the more vulnerable ones here–with greater likelihood of infection and burden–and should be given the greater attention.
Core problems with the original female condoms have been resolved (strength, cost, noise, comfort), so there's no legitimate reason for a condom that affords more pleasure for the man and more control for the woman to slowly reach society (developed or not) other than it's convenient to retain some of the existing psychology of protected sex. These hurdles come to mind:
1) Physiology: the man can opt to put protection on only when he wants sex; however the woman can put protection in in advance, revealing a sexual interest and readiness before the event. And in that change the woman may get stigmatized.
2) Objectification: When a man puts one on, like a glove to a hand, the impression is protecting the object being covered from the place into which it's going (penis into vagina). When a woman puts one in, the impression is reversed: protecting the vagina from the penis. Subtle, but perhaps true.
3) Leadership: Taking control of the protection by putting protection in vs. on one's own body is a shift of power from one gender to the other.
I’m glad to hear that around the world its use is being promoted by health organizations, and manufacturing has increased with the FC2. The marketing/education roles they play will be essential to popularize this relatively new form of protected sex.
Who knows which product will take in which societies and for what reasons? or whether the presence of both male & female condoms will effect the psychology or increase the dialogue among partners to ensure that some method is used?
I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you down the road!
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