Activists fear Zuma's court testimony will set a disastrous example and undermine years of prevention campaigns against a virus that has infected up to six million South Africans - the highest number anywhere in the world.  
 
Zuma, who is accused of raping a 31-year-old family friend at his home, said this week that the sex was consensual and initiated by the woman and that he did not use a condom because he believed the risk of contracting the disease was minimal for a man.  
 
Under cross-examination, Zuma said that he took a shower after intercourse with the AIDS activist because "it was one of the things that would minimise contact with the disease".  
Many were shocked at the comments from a person who as former head of the National AIDS Council was meant to spearhead government campaigns against the virus that kills up to 1,000 people every day in the country.  
 
"He is sending a very wrong impression to the youth, that if you engage in unprotected sex the transmission risks are minimal," said Nokhwezi Hoboyi, a spokeswoman for the Treatment Action Campaign.  
 
"It's the same sort of myth that you get with teenage pregnancy, that if you wash you might not get pregnant," said Annabel Kanabus, director of the AIDS charity AVERT.

"Grassroots prevention efforts will be terribly, terribly harmed by this. It will indirectly result in a lot of people dying because they will follow his example."  
 
Although statistically the risk of infection is lower for a man than a woman, experts say there are many other variables, including the degree of progression of the virus.  
 
Activists believe prevention efforts have already been hurt by the conflicting messages put out by South African leaders. President Thabo Mbeki has questioned the link between HIV and AIDS, and once claimed not to know anyone who died of the virus.  
 
A survey last year by the Human Sciences Research Council found 66% of respondents did not think they were at risk of infection - including just over half of those who tested positive for HIV. There is also a cultural reluctance to use condoms, despite the tendency for men to have multiple partners.  
 
"You don't eat a banana with the peel on," mother-of-four Tandiwe Baxheki said to a chorus of approval from dozens of Zuma supporters gathered outside the Johannesburg High Court yesterday.  
 
Zuma, who is still deputy president of the governing African National Congress, maintains the rape charges are part of a plot to destroy his lingering hopes of succeeding Mr Mbeki in 2009.  

Irish Examiner