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Condom flip-flop

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since its bold condom country ad campaign this summer, the AIDS Committee of Toronto (ACT) has spent plenty of time explaining statistical errors in the text, which initially attributed to Toronto the highest new HIV infection rate on the continent. Gay mag fab was among its harshest critics. Then, last week, a full-page ad from ACT executive director Charles Roy appeared in the mag lambasting not only ACT’s critics, but most especially fab for the negative publicity.

In the ad, Roy says that “the criticism published in fab comes from a tiny fringe group that denies that HIV causes AIDS, even that AIDS exists.”

Fab publisher Michael Schwarz says the ad wasn’t payback for negative stories, but “part of a current advertising contract we have with ACT.”

But Fab editor John Kennedy, the one who wrote a piece in an earlier issue questioning ACT’s “creative use of statistics,” isn’t happy with the decision.

“We don’t give out free ad space as a rule,” says Kennedy. “But it’s ultimately not my choice. I have to listen to my boss.”susan murray

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