N.Y. to Offer Million Free Condoms to Combat AIDS

Health officials in New York City said Thursday that they plan to distribute at least 1 million condoms a year to the public in an aggressive campaign to fight the spread of the AIDS virus.

The move was immediately opposed by the Archdiocese of New York, which also criticized a decision by at least 20 television stations across the country to accept and air commercials for condoms. The three major TV networks do not accept such ads, but CBS and NBC said Thursday that they would allow the individual stations they own to make their own decision about whether to broadcast them.

“Condoms are not an appropriate substitute for morality,” an archdiocese spokesman said. “The advertising of condoms, which seemingly condones immoral activity, would mislead the public into thinking that contraception is an adequate response to the problem of AIDS.”

Massive Eduction Plan

The plan to distribute the condoms through clinics and AIDS testing and counseling centers was announced by New York’s health commissioner, Dr. Stephen Joseph, who called for a massive education and training program to “demythologize” the condom.

“The latex condom is currently our most effective front-line weapon against increases in sexually transmitted diseases and especially the relentless epidemic of AIDS--which is surely our city’s most urgent health problem,” Joseph said.

“Everyone needs to be a condom expert, or condom comfortable,” he added.

The physician addressed a conference of health care professionals at New York University. He said he expected opposition to the Health Department’s plan to distribute the birth control devices.

“Some people fear that advocating condom use will encourage promiscuity and promote homosexuality, and what some might judge to be inappropriate birth control,” Joseph said.

‘Moral Dimensions’

He said the distribution program was established with concern for the “moral and ethical dimensions” of the plan. Joseph also called upon the television networks to accept condom advertising.

Both the advertising and the distribution plan were criticized by the archdiocese, which questioned the effectiveness of condoms as an AIDS prevention device.

“There are already many cases of AIDS reported despite the use of condoms,” the archdiocese spokesman said. “Are we going to advertise and supply clean needles as the appropriate solution to AIDS transmitted by drug abuse?”

Health officials in New York have been studying proposals to supply free clean needles to a control group of heroin addicts as an AIDS-prevention measure.