Thursday, December 06, 2007
Urge abstinence, but teach protection
From the RoundTable blog
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David Nova
Nova, of Roanoke, is vice president of Planned Parenthood Health Systems Inc.
If only abstinence-only education really worked. If only the "just say no" message presented in the classroom could somehow immunize students from the sexual pressuring of boyfriends, girlfriends and peers. Immunize them from the onset of hormonal changes that prompt deeper voices, growth of pubic hair and breasts, and feelings of sexual attraction.
Immunize them from the television programs that use sex to boost ratings in order to attract commercial sponsors -- and from sponsors who likewise use sex to boost the sale of their products. Immunize them from sexually charged role models, such as Britney, Paris, Madonna and other celebrities famous enough to be identified by one-word monikers.
If only we could immunize them even though we ourselves -- the parents and the educators -- in our most honest moments admit to having had sex before marriage (along with more than 90 percent of our aging contemporaries).
State Sen. Ken Cuccinelli ("Abstinence-only education works," Nov. 29) believes that, despite everything, such education is effective. He wants Gov. Tim Kaine to restore $275,000 for abstinence-only matching funds. For the past decade, the federal government has paid $4 for every $3 that Virginia contributes to teach abstinence in our classrooms.
Teach nothing but abstinence, and Congress will pay handsomely. Teach abstinence as well as prevention through contraception, and the feds contribute nothing. The financial incentives are hard to pass up in these lean budgetary times.
Yet, Virginia is the latest of 14 states to have rejected federal handouts for one important reason -- these taxpayer-funded abstinence programs have been scientifically shown to have no positive impact on risky sexual behavior. Moreover, by accepting the federal funding, school systems are prohibited from using other funds to also provide comprehensive sexuality education programs that have been proven effective in protecting teens from disease and pregnancy. States now realize that the public costs associated with teen births and increasing rates of sexually transmitted infections far exceed the federal enticements of abstinence-only education funding.
Ten years ago, when Congress began funding abstinence-only education at a quarter of a billion dollars a year, it also initiated a study to determine the effectiveness of the programs. In April, Mathematica Policy Research Inc. released its results. The multiyear investigation, conducted for the Department of Health and Human Services and authorized by Congress in 1997, found that abstinence-only programs are completely ineffectual.
The report concluded that youth in abstinence-only programs were no more likely to abstain from sex than control groups receiving no education. Youth in both abstinence-only and control groups had similar numbers of sexual partners and had initiated sex at the same average age. This is the very funding Cuccinelli wants reauthorized.
It appears that Cuccinelli confuses "abstinence" with abstinence-only education. Abstinence undoubtedly works. Abstinence-only education has been repeatedly proven not to work. For adolescents, abstinence is the best policy. For lawmakers, abstinence-only is the worst policy.
The senator's confusion stems from a belief that it is always wrong to teach more than abstinence regardless of the consequences. Tell that to the parents of a 15-year-old with a positive pregnancy test. Or to the married woman incapable of bearing children because years earlier she contracted chlamydia when having sex without a condom. We at Planned Parenthood confront these tragedies every day. We do so with the knowledge that with proper education, most of these tragedies could have been prevented.
Of course, abstinence would have prevented these tragedies better than condoms. Abstinence is the best and most effective means of doing so. No one disputes this. Every comprehensive sex education program in the country stresses this irrefutable fact. By providing comprehensive information, those who fail to heed the abstinence message are more likely to protect themselves from pregnancy and disease.
Comprehensive sex education is the harder choice. It is the more uncomfortable choice. It is difficult for parents and educators to speak to teens about sex and prevention. It is uncomfortable for teens to hear it, whether in the classroom or the living room. We can wish that abstinence-only education worked. Until it does, comprehensive sexuality education is the morally responsible education -- because it protects teens, because it saves lives, because it works.
