As recently as the 1970’s, a woman had to go to a doctor to find out if she was pregnant. The notion that you could simply go to a pharmacy and buy a pregnancy test was only a dream. Yet people questioned if a woman could bear the social embarrassment of being seen buying such a kit. And what if the cashier started a whisper campaign with everyone in town?

But home pregnancy tests arrived, and I would hazard to guess that most of the kids graduating from college today passed their very first test on one of those tiny strips which said the equivalent of “Yes! You are pregnant!”

Once the home test became available, women never looked back. While it posited a women would delay getting pre-natal care and an unwelcome pregnancy might drive a girl to suicide, once you suspect you’re pregnant, it’s far more anxiety-producing to schedule a doctor’s visit, confess to him or her you might be pregnant, take the blood test, which is now on your record, and wait for the results. Especially if there was a wrong answer, whatever that wrong answer might be.

The same kinds of questions are being asked of in-home HIV tests, which can be marketed at any time, should the FDA give its approval.

One test, currently in use by doctors and medical facilities, costs considerably less than $20. A simple swab of the gums and a twenty-minute wait results in an indicator of positive or negative. So what’s the hold-up?

The questions are not about the test’s effectiveness or the skills required to administer it. The question is one of emotional impact. It has been thought that learning of a positive reading should be done in an environment which offers counseling and immediate and accurate medical information. One can imagine that your kitchen might not be the optimal place.

While HIV-positive status was once a long, slow, cruel death sentence, learning of it today is still life-altering, and in many ways, just as serious. Human feelings don’t do comparative analyses. And even today, without medical intervention, the virus takes its relentless and horrific course.

So as a society, how do we make this decision? What is the right thing to do?

A personal HIV test kit would obviously contain 800 #’s and websites, along with printed materials of every variety, all in anticipation of a positive HIV outcome. As shocking as that would be, there is a wider place in society for technology such as this.

From those who recall in the light of day that they have done something very foolish to the victims of date-rape, from individuals in intimate relationships who have found their partners to be less than truthful to couples who are ready to have a more committed relationship, these tests have a place. Even spouses of HIV-positive people can be regularly assured that there has been no transmission of the virus, an assurance which is important to both partners.

Kits could be purchased on the Internet and mailed in plain brown wrappers, or distributed by every kind of public resource from homeless shelters to university health centers. Public restrooms could have cash or credit card-operated dispensers.

While these scenarios are uncomfortable to consider, the transmission of HIV involve activities seldom discussed in the open. It is the very nature of HIV to lurk in silence, hiding itself even from its host.

So, for me it’s actually very simple: Put the HIV test kits on the open market. If we are going to stop the spread of HIV, we have to empower every individual.

I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.