Well, Mr. President, you're going to leave office next year knowing that you've brought us into an unjust war, ruined our environment, screwed our economic equality even more than it was, and, of course, managed to actually INCREASE teen-pregnancy and sexually-transmitted diseases:The Bush administration is proposing to double spending on sexual abstinence programs that bar any discussion of birth control or condoms to prevent pregnancy or AIDS despite a lack of evidence that such programs work. Of course, it's been known for a while now that this is a great idea if you're looking at it from a purely religious perspective. Otherwise, the outcome is pretty dim:A study by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on declining birth and pregnancy rates among teenagers concludes that prevention programs should emphasize abstinence and contraception.
"Both are important," said Dr. John Santelli, the lead author of the study, which has not been published.
In Minnesota, a study found that sexual activity doubled among junior high school students taking part in an abstinence-only program. The independent study, commissioned by the state's health department, recommended broadening the program to include more information about contraception. Of course, this reasearch is "unscientific" according to its detractors:Yet supporters of the abstinence programs said teens should be hearing more about refraining from sex.
"Kids in society are saturated with information about contraception and messages about encouraging casual, permissive sex," said Robert Rector, who helped write the administration's abstinence education program.
Rector discounted the Minnesota study as unscientific and said the CDC research does not give enough credit to abstinence.
The comprehensive sex education promoted by Advocates for Youth and other groups focuses on safe sex, not abstinence, said Rector, a senior researcher at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative-leaning think tank. Wagoner rejected the assertion and pointed to his group's Web site, which praises abstinence.
"Abstinence is the only 100 percent effective method for avoiding unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV," the site says. You know what? That's absolutely true. Abstinence IS the only way to prevent STDs and pregnancy. The problem is, you see, that only telling kids to be abstinent without a proper harm-reduction strategy being tied to it is ridiculous. Kids will still have sex, but they'll then go off and do it without the proper contraceptives, as the research has shown time and time again. But I guess you folks will know you're going to heaven or whatever magical happy place you're going to when you die because you promoted abstinence, right?
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