Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Good morning! You have an STD!

If you've ever been diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease (STD), you'll know the routine about being told to advise your partner and any previous partners who may have been exposed. The problem is - how do you do this with the least amount of embarrassment? One company has figured out a way - greeting cards in the form of e-cards.

Inspot.org is a public health website and it has come up with this e-postcard that allows you to notify previous sexual partners that you have an STD or a sexually transmitted infection (STI). All you have to do is provide the information about which STD and the site does the rest, including sending a list of local health resources to the postcard recipient.

While some people are enthusiastic about such a system of letting people know, some aren't quite as on board. What might it be like to get an email like that? Would you even open it? Would it go into your spam folder? Would someone else have the chance to open it and read its contents?

If you had to be contacted, would you be ok with finding out through an e-postcard or would a personal phone call (not voice mail) be better? Or is an e-postcard ok?

What do you think?