This is what everyone overlooks. No one uses a condom just once. Anyone who makes a condom part of his regular sex life is going to be using it scores of times, hundreds of times. A failure rate of 10% or even 1% may be acceptable when the undesired consequence is conception: human nature being what it is, most mothers tend to love their children no matter how inconvenient their arrival - and for the cold-hearted, stupid, or easily frightened, abortion is increasingly promoted as a way out. But when the down side is acquiring a lethal, wasting disease, the same odds become a lot less attractive. What's essential to remember is that the odds of failure increase over multiple uses. The same strategy that's 99% "safe" for a single occasion becomes only 90.4% reliable over 10 consecutive uses. For a carefree young man that's a month, or a week for a prostitute. Over 100 consecutive uses, "safety" drops to only 36.6%. (Remember, the condom only has to fail once for the users to become exposed.) And over 500 uses, the user has only a 0.7% expectation of being protected. And remember - these odds assume unrealistically ideal conditions. Studies indicate that most everyday users of condoms experience failure rates substantially higher than 1%.
What's clear is that over a period of just a few years, or even months, the condom strategy virtually guarantees the transmission of AIDS.
The twofold conclusion is obvious: first, far from attempting to impose a speculative theology, the Church's condemnation of condoms is a practical, hard-headed bid to save lives in the "real" world. Second, the Church's argument -- that only abstinence or marital continence can account for a drop in AIDS infection -- is spot on.