Monday
Apr162007
Failing grade for abstinence education
Monday, April 16, 2007 at 3:00AM
By Ellen Ratner
Blogs have changed what we get for news and fortunately the website rhrealitycheck.org picked up what otherwise would have been a buried story. This story was not about Iran, Iraq or even the Karl Rove e-mails. This story is about the Bush administration's beloved abstinence education – the very same abstinence education that has cost taxpayers up to $1.5 billion in local, state and federal funds.
The ''report'' in question was released late Friday afternoon and is titled, ''Impacts for Title V. Section 510, Abstinence Education Programs: Final Report.'' It was produced under a government contract for the Department of Health and Human Services and it clearly contains program evaluation information that the Bush administration does not want us to know.
The bottom line: the 10-year-old program that the Republicans passed and funded, the same program that the Bush Administration has touted far and wide, doesn't work. The researchers examined four model abstinence education programs. What they found out about teen sexuality will shock any Baby Boomer.
The evaluation team looked at four abstinence programs in rural Virginia and Mississippi and also in Miami and Milwaukee. According to the rules of the study, abstinence education had to include the notion that marriage was the only expected standard of sexual activity, and abstinence was the only way to avoid pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Participants were either interviewed four to six years after enrolling in the abstinence program, or were in the control group. All racial groups were represented in the evaluation study. Students were randomly assigned to get abstinence education or to the control group. Three of the programs were multi-year programs.
The findings: of the 2,057 youths surveyed, (all were under 17), half remained abstinent in both the group receiving education and the ones that did not, (the control group). Twenty-three percent of both groups had sex with a condom, 17 percent sometimes practiced ''safe sex,'' and 4 percent always had unprotected sex. But here is the real shocker: in both groups the average age for sexual intercourse was 14.9 years! One-fourth of the sexually active teens had three or more partners!
By anyone's standards, that is a ton of money spent for a little bit of abstinence and a lot of sex. I did an Internet search on ''abstinence education'' and found all sorts of trinkets and trash to give teens while educating them on the virtues of abstinence. In addition to pens, pencils and the like, you can even get stick-on tattoo's with phrases such as ''worth waiting for.'' A lot of money, taxpayer cash, a lot of promotion, and a ton of hype about morals. Liberals were seen as the bad guys when they resisted pouring money into the abstinence rat hole back in the mid '90s. Democrats were made to seem like they were promoting the summer of free love. It is bad enough to fund a program that doesn't work, the Bush administration wants to throw more money into the rat hole and increase the funding for abstinence education to $141 million. The program began with a $10 million budget in 1997.
The problem is that the Bush administration prefers politics to science. A recent resignation of the man in charge of abstinence education was welcome. Eric Keroack who was appointed right after the November elections was medical director of a clinic that believed that ''commercialization and distribution of birth control is demeaning to women, degrading of human sexuality and adverse to human health and happiness.'' This man is a scientist? The facts and the outcome studies are going to see the light of day as the abstinence education bill sunsets this year. The debate in Congress might be more ''R'' rated then the Clinton impeachment.
Fortunately, five states have rejected the Title V money. Ohio's Democrat Gov. Strickland, who is a psychologist and a minister, doesn't think abstinence education works. Democrat Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey wants to fund sex education, but believes that the education should be comprehensive and deal with the reality that our youth are sexually active.
Why confuse ourselves or our youth with the facts? Answer: because AIDS and STDs are still a major public health problem – along with teen pregnancy. The reality is that like it or not, teens are having sex. It is it time they got real information that will not only help them make safe choices but that will keep them alive and well. We can't afford abstinence education. It doesn't work.
Blogs have changed what we get for news and fortunately the website rhrealitycheck.org picked up what otherwise would have been a buried story. This story was not about Iran, Iraq or even the Karl Rove e-mails. This story is about the Bush administration's beloved abstinence education – the very same abstinence education that has cost taxpayers up to $1.5 billion in local, state and federal funds.
The ''report'' in question was released late Friday afternoon and is titled, ''Impacts for Title V. Section 510, Abstinence Education Programs: Final Report.'' It was produced under a government contract for the Department of Health and Human Services and it clearly contains program evaluation information that the Bush administration does not want us to know.
The bottom line: the 10-year-old program that the Republicans passed and funded, the same program that the Bush Administration has touted far and wide, doesn't work. The researchers examined four model abstinence education programs. What they found out about teen sexuality will shock any Baby Boomer.
The evaluation team looked at four abstinence programs in rural Virginia and Mississippi and also in Miami and Milwaukee. According to the rules of the study, abstinence education had to include the notion that marriage was the only expected standard of sexual activity, and abstinence was the only way to avoid pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Participants were either interviewed four to six years after enrolling in the abstinence program, or were in the control group. All racial groups were represented in the evaluation study. Students were randomly assigned to get abstinence education or to the control group. Three of the programs were multi-year programs.
The findings: of the 2,057 youths surveyed, (all were under 17), half remained abstinent in both the group receiving education and the ones that did not, (the control group). Twenty-three percent of both groups had sex with a condom, 17 percent sometimes practiced ''safe sex,'' and 4 percent always had unprotected sex. But here is the real shocker: in both groups the average age for sexual intercourse was 14.9 years! One-fourth of the sexually active teens had three or more partners!
By anyone's standards, that is a ton of money spent for a little bit of abstinence and a lot of sex. I did an Internet search on ''abstinence education'' and found all sorts of trinkets and trash to give teens while educating them on the virtues of abstinence. In addition to pens, pencils and the like, you can even get stick-on tattoo's with phrases such as ''worth waiting for.'' A lot of money, taxpayer cash, a lot of promotion, and a ton of hype about morals. Liberals were seen as the bad guys when they resisted pouring money into the abstinence rat hole back in the mid '90s. Democrats were made to seem like they were promoting the summer of free love. It is bad enough to fund a program that doesn't work, the Bush administration wants to throw more money into the rat hole and increase the funding for abstinence education to $141 million. The program began with a $10 million budget in 1997.
The problem is that the Bush administration prefers politics to science. A recent resignation of the man in charge of abstinence education was welcome. Eric Keroack who was appointed right after the November elections was medical director of a clinic that believed that ''commercialization and distribution of birth control is demeaning to women, degrading of human sexuality and adverse to human health and happiness.'' This man is a scientist? The facts and the outcome studies are going to see the light of day as the abstinence education bill sunsets this year. The debate in Congress might be more ''R'' rated then the Clinton impeachment.
Fortunately, five states have rejected the Title V money. Ohio's Democrat Gov. Strickland, who is a psychologist and a minister, doesn't think abstinence education works. Democrat Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey wants to fund sex education, but believes that the education should be comprehensive and deal with the reality that our youth are sexually active.
Why confuse ourselves or our youth with the facts? Answer: because AIDS and STDs are still a major public health problem – along with teen pregnancy. The reality is that like it or not, teens are having sex. It is it time they got real information that will not only help them make safe choices but that will keep them alive and well. We can't afford abstinence education. It doesn't work.
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