Contact: Colin Mason, Population Research Institute, 540-622-5240 ext 209

FRONT ROYAL, Va., April 21 /Christian Newswire/ -- According to Joan Robinson, a researcher at the Population Research Institute, studies show that there is a strong scientific link between hormonal contraceptives and a woman's risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. The article, entitled "The Pill's Deadly Affair with HIV/AIDS," is available upon request from PRI, as well as by visiting our web site: www.pop.org.

According to Robinson, more than 50 medical studies to date have investigated a link between hormonal contraceptive use and HIV/AIDS infection. "The science is settled," Robinson says. "Hormonal contraceptives -- the oral pill and Depo-Provera -- increase almost all known risk factors for HIV, from upping a woman's risk of infection, to increasing the replication of the HIV virus, to speeding the debilitating and deadly progression of the disease."

This scientific consensus has received almost no publicity to date, Robinson continues, because of strong economic and ideological forces that push the pill.

"The 'family planning' types dismiss out of hand the impressive body of scientific research demonstrating a Pill/HIV link," she says, "preferring to rely on a handful of their own highly questionable trials which claim to find 'no increase in HIV risk among users of oral contraceptives and Depo-Provera.' This is like relying on a tobacco company to monitor a study on the link between cigarettes and cancer."

Those concerned about population growth, especially in Africa, also turn a blind eye. Robinson writes that many U.S.-funded groups remain intent on pushing these drugs on women in developing countries, even though that increases their risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. "Population control groups continue to lobby for more hormonal contraception, not less," she writes. "How many lives are being lost because we continue to ship boatloads of hormonal contraceptives to a continent and to countries laboring under an HIV/AIDS pandemic? Isn't it time that we stopped?"

"Groups like USAID and the U.N. Population Fund must recognize the danger of recklessly pushing hormonal contraception on populations suffering from the scourge of AIDS," says Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute. "How many African women have died because their 'free' birth control pills cost them their lives?"

Joan Robinson and Steven Mosher are both available for interview by contacting colin@pop.org.