So would an effective microbicide eliminate the need for condoms?
No. Microbicides will probably never inhibit viral

transmission by 100 per cent. The first generation microbicides are likely to be about 60 per cent effective if used properly and consistently. But the point is that this is a harm minimisation tool. Many women and men world-wide don't or can't use condoms or find it difficult to negotiate condom use even if they want to.
A microbicide can be used by a woman or (rectally) by a man, possibly without their partner knowing, and it will protect them and their partner from transmission of HIV and STIs during intercourse. It minimises risk and prevents transmission at times when the only other alternative might be totally unprotected sex. Anna Foss of the London School of Tropical Hygiene & Medicine estimated that a 60 per cent effective microbicide could stop an estimated 2.5 million infections over three years. (In 2001 there were five million new infections worldwide).
Will it be used where it's most needed?
Heidi Jones from the Population Council reminded us that, globally, more women are infected than men, being biologically more vulnerable to infection. A lot of these women (or their men) have cultural reservations about the use of lubrication during sex. Attitudes about female wetness and female orgasm vary from culture to culture.
In some African cultures, we've heard a lot about 'dry sex' as being a factor that increases women's vulnerability to HIV infection. There is more likely to be a risk of HIV transmission from an HIV positive man to an HIV negative women than if she is wet.

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In this context, dry sex is more about what men don't do: ie men do not engage in any foreplay, thus the woman is kept relatively dry and considered