LOCAL AND COMMUNITY NEWS
MISSOURI: "Safer Sex Practices Is Guardian Project Goal"
St. Louis Post-Dispatch (07.26.04)::Eun-Kyung Kim

The AIDS Foundation of St. Louis is gearing up for the September launch of the Guardian Project, a two-year social marketing campaign aimed at providing HIV prevention and testing information to young men who have sex with men. The project, funded by a $194,000 Missouri Foundation for Health grant, promotes safe sex as a permanent lifestyle behavior.

Throughout St. Louis, billboards, radio messages and bus shelters will feature Guardian Project messages. The first set will ask, "Who's Looking Out For You?" and others will describe condoms as "Software For Your Hardware," and call HIV "The Virus of Mass Destruction." Young men dressed as uniformed "Guardian captains" will distribute condoms and answer questions at bars, nightclubs, coffee houses, and on the streets. A sleek Guardian logo will be embossed on the condom packages and on postcards and coasters that will be widely distributed in bars and clubs.

Duane Westhoff, a Guardian captain, said the goal is to saturate young MSM with an instantly recognizable Guardian image and its safe-sex message. Guardian's emphasis is not to scare people away from having sex but to encourage them to be smarter about the decisions they make, said Lawrence Lewis, another captain.

Lewis pointed out that many of the young people he works with as an HIV/AIDS counselor have mistaken notions about HIV. "When it comes down to it, there is so much misinformation out there and people don't really know where to go to talk about it. Hopefully, we will be that resource for them," Lewis added.