But If They Really Want To Stop the Spread of STDs, They Should Put Abe Beame[*] on the Thing
New York--modern Rome, Gotham, Fun City--is ready to take the most successful municipal p.r. campaign ever ("I Love New York") to new heights (or lows) by introducing an offical Big Apple condom:
New York City hands out 1.5 million free condoms a month in ordinary wrappers, and health officials figure people would be more likely to actually use them if the packaging were more distinctive
"Brands work, and people use branded items more than they use non-branded items, whether it's a cola or a medicine, even," Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden said.
Frieden, who obviously has taken a Learning Annex course or two (or maybe just watched the Tom Cruise movie Cocktail), suggests that one of the possible designs for the wrapper could be a map of the NY subway line because, you know, there's nothing sexier than stinking underground tunnels with trains running through them 24/7.
[*] Mandatory Headline Allusion Explainer: Abe Beame, who died in 2001, was mayor of New York for one term, from 1974-1977, arguably the city's bleakest period (at least in recent history). He is a known contraceptive prophylactic.
