Q: SOMETIMES when I travel on a business trip, I am pressured by my overseas colleagues to enjoy the company of a lady for hire. I am very health conscious and as I do see other girlfriends in Hong Kong I try to be very careful about transmitting any diseases which could cause health problems.
My friends tell me that the ladies for hire now carry medical certificates which state that they are free from contagious and sexually transmitted diseases. Should I trust these certificates? Can I rest assured that the health risk is minimal if I have sex in a commercial sex establishment with a woman who is medically certified? Dr Rose writes: I would not personally trust any medical certificates offered by any commercial sex establishments. Such certificates only indicate the woman's health status at the time she was examined. If she has been exposed to a sexually transmitted disease, such as herpes, she would not develop any symptoms until seven to 10 days after exposure. If the examination was done prior to the 10-day period, the test would not detect the disease.
Because the average prostitute services as many as 30 clients a day, it is highly probable that immediately after she has been given a clean bill of health, she goes on to have sex with another client and exposes herself to many sources of potential infection.
Don't take any chances. Any contact with a prostitute places you at high risk of contracting a sexually transmitted disease including gonorrhea, syphilis, herpes, chlamydia, hepatitis and AIDS. If you do decide to have sex with a prostitute, take precautions and make sure you wear a condom. Also, remember that oral sex can also transmit some diseases and is not 100 per cent safe.
Q. I notice that one of my friend's children stutters occasionally. He is four years old. Is it due to stress and poor self-esteem? Is it something that he can control? His parents think he will outgrow the problem and have not sought professional help.
Dr Rose writes: Stuttering, which occurs in about one per cent of the general population, is a speech disorder in which the speaker repeatedly hesitates and delays uttering words.
Temporary stuttering in young children between the ages of two and four is fairly common and is not necessarily related to stress and poor self-esteem. In fact, the latest studies show that stuttering is more likely to be physiologically based and not related to an inferiority complex.