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Thursday 18
December
2003
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CHILE:
Stations Opposed to AIDS Campaign
Accused of Double Standards
Gustavo González
SANTIAGO, (IPS) - Scantily-clad models
and actors telling off-colour jokes are
stars on the same TV channels in Chile
that have refused to run government ads
that encourage the use of condoms to
prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS.
The Unified Movement of Sexual
Minorities (MUMS) has taken legal action
against three TV stations that have
refused to broadcast the spots produced
as part of the latest government AIDS
prevention campaign.
The stations say the ads run counter to
their editorial policy by promoting the
use of condoms, and because one of the
spots shows a gay couple being
physically affectionate.
But MUMS and other civil society
organisations accuse the TV stations of
double standards.
The refusal to air the campaign's four
ads amounts to an attack on Chileans'
right to health, because AIDS is a
serious public health problem, argues
the lawsuit brought on Dec. 15 by human
rights lawyer Julia Urquieta,
representing MUMS.
According to the governmental National
AIDS Commission (CONASIDA), there are
5,200 people living with HIV, the AIDS
virus, in this Southern Cone country of
16 million, as well as 4,600 people with
the symptoms of full-blown AIDS.
But non-governmental organisations
estimate the number of people testing
positive for HIV at between 20,000 and
50,000.
Channel 13, which belongs to the
Catholic University of Santiago, and the
Catholic University of Valparaíso's TV
station say they are following the
position of the Roman Catholic Church,
which rejects the use of condoms and
promotes abstinence or monogamy within a
stable relationship to prevent the
spread of HIV.
A similar stance is taken by Ricardo
Claro, the conservative businessman who
owns the private Megavisión channel, the
third free-to-air TV station opposed to
the government's sixth prevention
campaign, which was launched Dec. 1 at a
cost of one million dollars.
Megavisión and the Catholic TV stations
have refused to air ads promoting the
use of condoms since the government's
first televised anti-AIDS campaign, in
1991.
But on this occasion their stance has
drawn howls of outrage, reflecting a
change in Chilean society which, even
though it is heavily Catholic and
socially conservative in many respects,
is not toeing the Church hierarchy's
line in this case.
In a survey by the local daily La
Tercera, 87 percent of respondents said
they accepted the promotion of the use
of condoms.
Activists accuse the three stations of
double standards, and of taking a
moralistic stance against the campaign
that is not reflected in other parts of
their programming.
''Morandé y Compañía'', the Megavisión
programme with the highest ratings, is a
variety show where vulgarity, crude
jokes and barely-dressed women abound.
The most popular skit is the shower
scene, in which model Marlene Olivarí's
thin dress becomes transparent as she
gets wet.
Carmen Bascuñán, with Megavisión's
public relations department, told IPS
that the station is opposed to the
anti-AIDS campaign because ''it does not
fit in with our editorial line.''
The journalist denied any inconsistency
or double standards on the part of the
station. ''They are two completely
different arguments,'' she said when
asked about the AIDS campaign in
comparison to the ''Morandé y Compañía''
show.
''The issue is much deeper than merely
responding why Marlene Olivarí appears
with scant clothing. The two positions
are not comparable,'' said Bascuñán,
before abruptly cutting off her
conversation with IPS.
Meanwhile, one of the lead characters on
the most popular Chilean TV series this
year, ''Machos'', aired by channel 13,
was a homosexual.
The president of the National Television
Council, Patricia Politzer, welcomed the
fact that a gay character who was
neither effeminate nor had
overly-stereotyped mannerisms was shown
in a local programme for the first time.
Actors Diego Muñoz, Renato Munster,
Ingrid Cruz and Berta Lasala, from the
cast of ''Machos'', publicly spoke out
in favour of the campaign promoting the
use of condoms.
The world of ''Chilean TV is full of
homosexuals. We are urging them not to
keep silent,'' said MUMS spokesman Marco
Ruz, who celebrated the launch of the
government's anti-AIDS campaign with a
choreographed performance outside the
presidential palace of La Moneda.
Late-night viewers of the station that
belongs to the Catholic University of
Valparaíso can also see suggestive ads
featuring a semi-nude woman, a phone
number, and the question ''Are You
Alone?''
The station's executive vice-president,
Jorge Bornschever, denied in remarks to
IPS that the spots are advertising for
sexual services. Besides, he argued,
''They are aired in a late-late night
slot, as late-late night as it gets, at
three or four in the morning, while the
other (the AIDS prevention campaign) is
on during the day, when children are
around.''
''It's simple,'' added Bornschever.
''The station belongs to the Catholic
University, to the Catholic Church, and
operates in accordance with the line
followed by the institution, which says
that the way to prevent AIDS is not
through the use of condoms.''
Recent paedophilia scandals that have
shaken the Catholic Church in Chile have
been another cause of complaints
regarding the Church hierarchy's
conservative position towards AIDS
prevention.
''Tato the priest does not use
condoms,'' the fortnightly local
publication The Clinic sarcastically
wrote in reference to a priest, José
Andrés Aguirre, who was convicted and
sentenced for raping several girls in
his parish, one of whom became pregnant.
In its latest rejection of the promotion
of condoms, the Church hierarchy invoked
supposedly scientific reasons, according
to which condoms are not safe, because
they are ''only'' 80 percent effective
in preventing the transmission of HIV.
But ''Even if they were just 40 percent
effective, their use would be
recommendable, since the option is no
protection,'' Sandro Salinas, a
22-year-old university student,
commented to IPS.
''It must be made clear that people
don't get this disease (AIDS) by playing
chess,'' said Health Minister Pedro
García, defending the promotion of
condom use. ''In 94 percent of cases it
is transmitted through sexual relations,
and that is what the campaign has to
clearly get across,'' he added.
The condom has proven to be highly
effective in curbing the spread of
HIV/AIDS, said Geneviève Paicheler, a
French expert on AIDS prevention
campaigns, on a recent visit to
Santiago.
Paicheler, a sociologist, said that in
France, ''the campaigns not only talk
about the use of condoms, but about the
different kinds of couples and sexual
partners, and the best lubricants as
well.''
In countries like France, Spain, the
United States, Canada, Argentina and
Brazil, anti-AIDS campaigns are becoming
more explicit in promoting condoms and
raising awareness on how to use them
correctly. The debate in Europe calmed
down ''when several priests and bishops
spoke out in defence of the use of the
condom,'' said Paicheler.
To counteract the Catholic Church's
campaign in Chile, the Health Ministry
posted on its web site an academic
analysis of the latest research carried
out on the effectiveness of the condom.
In Italy, HIV transmission occurred in
only 1.7 percent of cases when condoms
were used by couples made up of an
HIV-positive individual and a healthy
partner. Under the same circumstances,
the transmission rate was 2.4 percent in
Haiti, the country in the Americas with
the highest proportion of people living
with HIV/AIDS.
''The high level of effectiveness of the
condom demonstrated by the great
majority of existing studies backs up
its incorporation as a public health
measure that, although it does not
completely eliminate the possibility of
HIV transmission, does considerably
reduce it, and this fact alone justifies
its use as a prevention strategy,'' says
the Ministry.
In its analysis of 25 studies conducted
in recent years, the Health Ministry
found that the effectiveness of the
condom ranged from 60 to 97 percent, and
averaged 87 percent. In addition, it
found that condoms broke, due to
inexperience or misuse, in just 0.5
percent of cases of vaginal sex.
The Health Ministry also responds to
another argument set forth by the
Catholic Church in Chile by clarifying
that the HIV virus measures 100
nanometers, while pores that can be
found in latex condoms are no bigger
than 30 nanometers in diameter.
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