Yesterday I said I would post some of the info from studies I've seen and that
we offer at my workplace (WSA Pharmacy).  This is in response to the query
concerning condom failure rates...
 
March 1989 - Consumer Reports did a study of latex condoms.  They rated condoms
on price, lubrication, spermicide, texture, conture, and variability.  Based on
these criteria - the Saxon Gold Circle Coin was ranked first, with a projected
maximum failure rate (whatever that is) of 1.5%
1)	Gold Circle Coin
2)	LifeStyles Extra Strength Lubricated
3)	Saxon Wet Lubricated (blue box)
4)	Ramses Non-Lubricated Reservoir End
5)	Sheik Non-Lubricated Reservoir End
6)	Excita Extra
7)	Sheik Elite
8)	Koromex with Nonoxynol-9
 
Some salient points - LifeStyles ExtraStrength with Nonoxynol-9 - you might
expect extra-strength to mean that these have a lower failure rate - in  t(fact,
the projected maximum failure rate is more than 10%!!!
 
 
Consumer Reports conclusion - no condom is perfect, and individual preferences
vary.  But there are some condoms that are consistently better than others as
evaluated by their criteria.
 
Also - one in four people of 3300 condom-users surveyed reported at least one
condom breaking in the past year.
 
UCLA - This condom study subjected 14 condom brannds to additional tests to
specifically determine if they would permit leakage of HIV.
These 14 were from their list of 31 brans that they ranked according to water
and air leakage, tensile strength, etc.
1)	Mentor
2)	Ramses Sensitol
3)	Ramses Non-lubricated
4)	Gold Circle Coin
5)	Gold Circle
6)	Sheik Elite
7)	Durex Nuform
8)	Tojan-Enz
 
These condoms leaked HIV:
Lifestyles Conture
Trojan Naturalube
Trojan Ribbed
Contracept Plus