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New report demonstrates – yes, again – that ab-only programs don’t work

Rachel

But we’ll keep cranking them out until these ineffective, disproven, misleading programs go away – or at least no longer receive federal funding.

This week’s report is from SEICUS and focuses on Florida specifically. I never forgot this article I read year – although I can’t for the life of me find it right now – citing a report that found teens in Florida, a state which relies heavily on federal ab-only funding, who believed drinking a can of Mt. Dew would prevent unintended pregnancy, or drinking a capful of bleach would prevent HIV/AIDS.

SEICUS found programs like those Sumter County Public Schools, which allows Christian Care Center to lead its ab-only programs, teaching from a curriculum that does not believe in contraception and says that “no contraceptive device is guaranteed to prevent teen pregnancy. Besides, students who do not exercise self-control to remain abstinent are not likely to exercise self-control in the use of a contraceptive device.”

And how’s that working out for you, Florida?

The most recent data available shows Florida has the third highest rate in the nation of new AIDS diagnoses, the fifth highest rate of new HIV infections; teen pregnancy rates that are the sixth highest in the nation; nearly two-thirds of all new sexually transmitted diseases in the state were among young people; and 15% of new HIV infections occurred among those under the age of 25. In sum, Florida has some of the worst health outcomes on these key indicators of reproductive and sexual health nationwide.

Here are highlights from the report – the full report can be found here.

13 thoughts on New report demonstrates – yes, again – that ab-only programs don’t work

  2. Pingback: How Is Flori-duh’s “Abstinence” Program Working Out? « The Legal Satyricon

  3. I wonder whether these abstinence only programs are even meant to prevent pregnancy. The New Yorker has an article, “Red Sex, Blue Sex” http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/11/03/081103fa_fact_talbot that seems to suggest pregnancy prevention may not be the goal of ab-only sex ed. Perhaps the point of ab-only sex ed is to have young girls become pregnant, to keep them in traditional female roles. I do not endorse this, but I think that could explain the continued popularity of ab-only sex ed, despite evidence that it does not work.

  5. I grew up in Florida and this makes me so sad and angry. I got exceptional sex education there in the 80s. State’s gone to hell in a hand basket. 🙁

  6. I have to wonder why the parents aren’t educating their kids about condom use when clearly protection is vast;y becoming a matter of health or AIDS. Yes there will be teens who abstain simply because its what THEY want to do, you can’t be with your teenager 24/7 and you can not stop them form having sex. The only thing you could really do is tell them what YOU want them to do and let them know if they feel so inclined to disobey to PLEASE use protection, no matter what anyone says. I’d rather have an honest son without STDs/STIs or unwanted fatherhood than one who pretends to be a virgin yet has an incurable STD or STI or even has unwanted fatherhood pending.

  7. drinking a capful of bleach would prevent HIV/AIDS.

    In addition to the frighting pregnancy and STI rates, what’s the rate of bleach-related poisionings in the state, now? **shudders**

  8. You’ve got it, Jenna. The lies that are spewed about contraceptives and STI prevention are in some ways more terrifying than the ab-only programs themselves.

  9. But guys, don’t you get it? If teenagers would just listen and stop having sex, we wouldn’t have these problems!

    Then, when they get married to another virgin, they can ride off into the sunset on a snow white unicorn of purity.

    😉

  10. Hm….Maybe if states stop treating teenagers like idiots (“Well, if they can’t just control themselves and stop having sex, they’ll never control themselves to use contraception”), they’ll oblige by not acting as such!

    Funny how when kids are treated as smart and worthwhile, they actually oblige….

  11. I do not understand why no parent has raised a serious 1st Amendment challenge to abstinence only, which is so clearly based on a religious agenda especially when actually taught by a religious organization! Has anyone ever heard of this sort of challenge? Maybe it’s just that no parent is willing to stand up and say, “I’m in favor of teen sex.”

    Relatedly, I wonder why there has been no serious Title IX challenge to the abstinence-only curricula that push totally sexist gender stereotypes on kids. (I.e., girls are sluts, guys only want sex, girls are damaged if they have sex.) (Title IX is the federal law that bans gender discrimination in public schools.)

  13. Thanks for that link to the Louisiana case. That case was based on very explicit religious content (e.g., “Jesus wants you to be chaste.”) But I wonder if you could also attack the very premise of abstinence only as religious indoctrination, even if there’s no explicit reference to Jesus. At root, it’s a fundamentally religious concept being pushed, that you should stay abstinent before marriage. If it were a truly *secular* and non-faith based doctrine about adolescent health, then it would have to incorporate other forms of birth control.

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