Teen Sexuality and Pregnancy - Std And Pregnancy Prevention Programs For Teens

Abstinence

In response to the growing concern about out-of-wedlock births and the threat of AIDS, several national youth organizations and religious groups began campaigns in the early and mid-1990s to encourage teens to sign an abstinence pledge—a promise to abstain from sexual activity until marriage. In January 2001 researchers at Columbia and Yale universities released a study finding that by 1995 2.5 million teens (10% of adolescent boys and 16% of girls) had taken a "virginity pledge" ("Virginity Pledge Helps Teens Delay Sexual Activity," National Institutes of Health News Release, January 5, 2001). The analysis showed that, on average, teens who took the pledge delayed having sex about one-third longer than teens who had not pledged. However, the effectiveness of pledging depended on the student's age. Among teens aged eighteen and older, pledging had no effect. Among sixteen and seventeen year olds, pledgers delayed sex about eighteen months longer than those who did not pledge. Among the youngest teens, the effect of pledging depended on the social environment of the teen's school.

The 2003 Youth Risk Behavior Survey found that 65.7% of high school students—65.4% of females and 66.2% of males—claimed to be sexually inactive at the time of the survey (no sexual intercourse during the three months prior to the survey). (See Table 7.1.) The rate of inactivity was higher among younger students (78.8% of ninth graders and 51.1% of twelfth graders). More white students (69.2%) were sexually inactive than Hispanic (62.9%) or African-American students (51%).

The administration of President George W. Bush placed a new stress on abstinence among teens. According to the February 2002 White House report Working toward Independence, an overview of President Bush's suggested plan for welfare reform, "the goal of Federal policy should be to emphasize abstinence as the only certain way to avoid both unintended pregnancies and STDs." As of July 15, 2003, sixty-two Adolescent Family Life abstinence education programs were funded by the Department of Health and Human Services. The directorship of the programs was transferred to the Administration for Children and Families Family and Youth Services Bureau on June 9, 2004. In fiscal year 2004 $33 million was available for making grants to provide abstinence education to adolescents.

Sex and STD/HIV Education in Schools

As of July 1, 2004, thirty-eight states and the District of Columbia required schools to provide education on HIV/AIDS and other STDs. (See Table 7.4.) Thirty-six of these states and the District of Columbia allowed parents to remove their children from sex education classes. Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia required schools to provide education on sexuality in addition to HIV/AIDS and STD education. Twelve states did not have laws requiring schools to provide sex or STD/HIV education. Twenty-one states required schools to stress the importance of abstinence in STD and HIV/AIDS education; nine states required abstinence to be covered. (Michigan passed a law in June 2004 that abstinence must be not only covered, but stressed, effective in 2005.) Seventeen states required schools to teach students about contraception, but none required that it be stressed.

The CDC reported that, as of December 31, 2002, 5,108 adolescents thirteen to nineteen years of age had been diagnosed with AIDS since the beginning of the epidemic. In addition, because of the long dormancy period of the virus (an average of ten years), many people who are diagnosed in their twenties were infected during their adolescent years. According to Child Health USA 2002, about 58% of adolescent AIDS cases were males and 42% were females. Most males contracted the virus through homosexual activities, clotting products (for hemophilia), or blood transfusions. Most females contracted the virus through heterosexual contact or IV drug use (either their own drug use or drug use by their partners).

In 2000 the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation conducted a survey of teens on topics related to HIV and AIDS. The survey found that about one in five teens (21%) was either not sure if there was an AIDS cure or believed there was one. Most adolescents knew sharing IV needles (92%) and having unprotected sex (91%) increases the risk of infection, but smaller numbers were aware of the risk from unprotected oral sex (69%) or from partners with another STD (41%). Only half (51%) knew there were drug treatments available that could lengthen an AIDS patient's life. When asked how much they had learned about AIDS/HIV in school, 78% of students responded either "some" or "a lot." Still, more than half of the teens wanted more information about how to protect themselves from HIV infection (57%) and where to go to get tested for HIV (55%).

According to the Youth Risk Behavior Survey report of 1997, 91.5% of all students were taught about AIDS or HIV in school that year. A slightly lower percentage of students

TABLE 7.4

(87.9%) reported in 2003 that they had learned about the disease in school. As HIV/AIDS is increasingly common among young people, the declining percentages of students who learn about the disease in school is problematic.