No.' 'A venereal disease is one that is so terribly difficult to catch that only intercourse or deep kissing is likely to pass it on.

There is a general belief that one can be infected during the act of deep kissing.

"Now, that I can do," he said, and got back to the deep kissing.

Second base was deep kissing, plus groping and fondling this and that.

Tonsil hockey, as used at Farrar, Straus & Giroux to mean "deep kissing," is at least a decade old, having replaced tonsil boxing.

There is one case suggesting that a person with the AIDS virus can transmit it through deep kissing.

There is a remote risk from deep, open-mouth kissing if there are sores or bleeding gums and blood is exchanged.

The risk of spreading the virus through "deep" kissing in which large amounts of saliva are exchanged is extremely low.

(Yes, fourth graders can now do a 70-minute "King and I," albeit without the deep kissing.)