Unsafe sexual practices

Safe sex is sexual activity using methods or devices (such as condoms) to reduce the risk of transmitting or acquiring sexually transmitted infections (STIs), especially HIV. 'Safe sex' is also sometimes referred to as safer sex or protected sex to indicate that some safe sex practices do not completely eliminate STI risks. It is also sometimes used colloquially to describe methods aimed at preventing pregnancy that may or may not also lower STI risks. The concept of 'safe sex' emerged in the 1980s as a response to the global AIDS epidemic, and possibly more specifically to the AIDS crisis in the US. Promoting safe sex is now one of the main aims of sex education and STI prevention, especially reducing new HIV infections. Safe sex is regarded as a harm reduction strategy aimed at reducing the risk of STI transmission. Although some safe sex practices (like condoms) can also be used as birth control (contraception), most forms of contraception do not protect against STIs. Likewise, some safe sex practices, like partner selection and low-risk sex behavior, might not be effective forms of contraception. Although strategies for avoiding STIs like syphilis and gonorrhea have existed for centuries and the term 'safe sex' existed in English as early as the 1930s, the use of the term to refer to STI-risk reduction dates to the mid-1980s in the United States. It emerged in response to the HIV/AIDS crisis. A year before the HIV virus was isolated and named, the San Francisco chapter of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence published a small pamphlet titled Play Fair! out of concern over widespread STIs among the city's gay male population. It specifically named illnesses (Kaposi's sarcoma and pneumocystis pneumonia) that would later be understood as symptoms of advanced HIV disease (or AIDS). The pamphlet advocated a range of safe-sex practices, including abstinence, condoms, personal hygiene, use of personal lubricants, and STI testing/treatment. It took a casual, sex-positive approach while also emphasizing personal and social responsibility. In May 1983--the same month HIV was isolated and named in France--the New York City-based HIV/AIDS activists Richard Berkowitz and Michael Callen published similar advice in their booklet, How to Have Sex in an Epidemic: One Approach. Neither publication used the term 'safe sex' but both included recommendations that are now standard advice for reducing STI (including HIV) risks. Safe sex as a form of STI risk reduction appeared in journalism as early as 1984, in the British publication 'The Intelligencer': ''The goal is to reach about 50 million people with messages about safe sex and AIDS education.' Although safe sex is used by individuals to refer to protection against both pregnancy and HIV/AIDS or other STI transmissions, the term was born in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. It is believed that the term safe sex was used in the professional literature in 1984, in the content of a paper on the psychological effect that HIV/AIDS may have on homosexual men. The term was related with the need to develop educational programs for the group considered at risk, homosexual men. A year later, the same term appeared in an article in The New York Times. This article emphasized that most specialists advised their AIDS patients to practice safe sex. The concept included limiting the number of sexual partners, using prophylactics, avoiding bodily fluid exchange, and resisting the use of drugs that reduced inhibitions for high-risk sexual behavior. Moreover, in 1985, the first safe sex guidelines were established by the 'Coalition for Sexual Responsibilities'. According to these guidelines, safe sex was practiced by using condoms also when engaging in anal or oral sex.