News

It has been 15 years since the female condom was unveiled, but the anniversary is an inauspicious one. Once touted as a key tool in the fight against HIV-AIDS, a way of empowering women whose partners shun traditional condoms, the female condom has largely been forgotten.

The fault lies not with the product itself but with set-in-their-ways policy makers, the international aid group Oxfam says in a scathing new report.

"This is a 15-year scandal born of ignorance and inertia," said Mary Robinson, Oxfam's honorary president. "We now know that millions of women might have been spared HIV, unwanted pregnancies, and empowered themselves in the process, if they had access to this simple method."

Ms. Robinson, former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said female condoms should be an integral part of HIV-AIDS and family-planning programs, and promoted as aggressively as male condoms.

A female condom is a lubricated polyurethane sheath inserted into the vagina prior to intercourse.

The main barrier to its use is cost, said Carlos Zarco, director of the Mexican AIDS group Rostros y Voces.

"The female condom is 18 times more expensive than a male condom. It's obvious why women are not using it more," he said.

Male condoms cost pennies and, in much of the world they are distributed widely and for free as part of HIV-AIDS prevention programs.

According to the 33-page Oxfam report, titled Failing Women, Withholding Protection, studies have repeatedly shown that female condoms are widely accepted and many women actually prefer them to male condoms.

There are about three billion male condoms sold worldwide each year, compared with 26 million female condoms, a ratio of 423:1.

The charitable group PATH has spent about $6-million developing a female condom that has a tampon-like capsule for easy insertion of a polyurethane pouch that is kept in place by dots of foam.

According to the Oxfam report, an additional $20-million investment would result in the two newer models being brought to market quickly and the competition would sharply lower prices.