Review of 'Sex, technology and public health', by Mark Davis: Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 208 pp., £50.00 (hardback), ISBN 9780230525627

Abstract

In 'Sex, technology and public health', Mark Davis seeks to explain why it is that 'technosexuality' (the sexual use of technology) is such a focus of public health concern, despite ambiguous evidence regarding the connection between sexual infection and HIV rates, and bio- and communications technologies. Davis argues that internet-mediated sexual partnering, or 'e-dating', and other forms of bio-technology, such as HIV treatments and Viagra, are not just objects of public health; rather, they are constituted though public health rationalities that are based on a medical model of disease/cure and a notion of citizenship that privileges rights and responsibilities. As such, they come into focus as sites for the intervention and the extension of public health governance.