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 Be an Askable Parent
Does your child feel it's OK to talk with you about
sexuality?
Read
more...
 Continue
to Learn
Anticipate your child's questions by learning the
stage of your child's sexual development. Read
more...
 Build
Bridges
If a child does not learn about sexuality issues
from a parent, the child will learn about sex elsewhere—from friends,
the internet, magazines, television and other sources. Read
more...
 Talking
to Your
Teens about
STIs
Each
year,
1 in
4 sexually
active
teens
will
get
an
STI.
Learn
what
you
can
do
as
a concerned
parent. Read
more...
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Talking
To Your Teens ::
Advice from Dr. James Allen, MD, MPH
Testing for Sexually Transmitted Infections |
Important for Disease Prevention in Youth
Dr. James R. Allen, MD, MPH
We
don't like talking with our youth about sex. Parents have
difficulty talking with their adolescent children about sex.
Schools often are constrained by societal pressures and funding
sources to provide “abstinence only” messages rather than
comprehensive sexual health information. In contrast, our
entertainment media portrays human sexuality as spontaneous
and idyllic, without complications of relationships or sexually
transmitted infections and unintended pregnancy.
The truth is that sexually transmitted
infections (also called STIs)
are an enormous problem in the United
States, especially for adolescents
and young adults. April is STD Awareness
Month and a good time
to talk about this uncomfortable but
important issue.
Each year, one of every four sexually
active teens will get a sexually transmitted infection. By age
25, half of all youth will have acquired one or more infections.
The number of new cases of sexually transmitted infections is
more than 9 million in people under the age of 25 each year.
Even worse, many of these are silent
infections without clinical symptoms. Despite the absence of symptoms,
long-term damage such as infertility can occur if infections are
not diagnosed and treated. And many youth (and adults) assume
that they would know if they or their partner had an infection.
The best way to be diagnosed with a
sexually transmitted infection is to be tested for it. Great strides
have been made in recent years in development of reliable tests
for many STIs using patient specimens that can be obtained easily.
Most youth assume they are being tested
for “all” STIs when they go to their
doctor. In fact, testing rarely occurs even for the more common
infections, even though healthcare guidelines and medical associations
recommend testing be done routinely.
Communication is an important issue
in obtaining testing. Just as adults are reluctant to discuss
sexual health issues with youth, youth are also reluctant to discuss
this with adults, including health care providers. Young people
need the necessary information to know what and how to ask for
tests for STIs.
Testing, treatment and communication
are all important in addressing the STI epidemic. But they are
not sufficient. Knowledge and prevention are essential also.
Of great concern is the politicization
of sexual health information, which makes it difficult to be certain
about the accuracy and context of messages. Groups that attack
the effectiveness of condoms for preventing STIs, for example,
hope this will encourage abstinence. Instead, it leaves our young
people at risk.
The simple fact is that condoms, used
correctly and consistently, provide substantial protection against
many STIs, including HIV infection. They do not protect against
all STIs or under all circumstances, but for a person who chooses
to be sexually active, using a condom is much better than not
using one.
The stigma attached to many diseases
such as cancer a generation ago has disappeared. But sexual behaviors
and STIs remain highly stigmatized in our country. This stigma
inhibits discussion with parents, partners, and health care providers
and discourages youth from seeking needed health care. Stigma
is a significant barrier to prevention. Social attitudes that
reinforce this shame do not reduce frequency of sexual contact
but they do reduce prevention behaviors and increase risk of infection.
It is biologically certain that our
children will grow up and become sexually mature. STIs have been
with humans for centuries. Information, education, supportive
social environments, and sound, well-funded public health programs
are effective at reducing risks of infection. Our failure to address
these issues leaves our youth vulnerable. We as a nation need
to review the lessons of the past and make effective control of
STIs a high priority.
The American Social Health Association (ASHA) is a 94-year-old
not-for-profit organization with offices in Washington, DC and Research Triangle
Park, NC. It is dedicated to educating about and preventing sexually transmitted
diseases and their complications
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