Updated 05/08/2010

Abstinence-only programs do not equip young people to deal with today's social realities. The result is that, unlike other countries, young people in the United States are not being prepared with knowledge about safe sex, resulting in our high rate of pregnancies and STD.

Sexual Abstinence Programs

After spending hundreds of millions of dollars promoting sexual abstinence throughout the United States, the results of studies seem clear. The main effect of the abstinence effort has been more teens having unprotected sex -- the highest percentage since the 1990s.

The result is a high percentage of sexual disease, unwanted pregnancies and abortions.

There is considerable evidence to support this.*

A recent UNICEF report said that the teenage birthrate in the U.S. is higher than any of the top 28 countries of the world. While U.S. tied Hungary for the most abortions, girls in the U.S. were not the most sexually active. Denmark holds that title. Even so, Denmark's rate of abortions is one half of that of the U.S. and its teen birthrate is one-sixth of ours.

The difference? Effective sex education.

According to USA Today, 50% of young people in the United States will contract a venereal disease before age 25, a percentage significantly higher than other countries.

The decline in contraceptive use may cheer those who have promoted faith-inspired school curriculums where there is no discussion of birth control. When condoms are mentioned it is to emphasize that they can fail. No one disputes that possibility, but without them the chances of pregnancy or sexual disease are far higher.

Although abstinence programs may have been a noble and even a moral effort, they have created more problems they the have solved.

Abstinence Pledges

Abstinence pledges are often signed by young people following emotional and often misleading talks on the dangers of sex. Studies show that more than 50% of the young people who sign these pledges break them within a year.

Parents and school boards around the country are getting the message and opting out of abstinence programs, saying the money would be better spent on effective sex education.

Even four years ago before the results of the latest studies were released a survey sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation, NPR, and Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, found that 65 percent of parents of high school students said that federal money, “should be used to fund more comprehensive sex education programs that include information on how to obtain and use condoms and other contraceptives.”

[Also see The Price of Prudery and Turing Logic Upside Down]

* Based in part on studies by Columbia University and the Alan Guttmacher Institute, Centers for Disease Control, and reports in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

In contrast to most research, The Washington Post in Feb. 2010, reported a study involving 662 African American students from four public middle schools in a city in the Northeastern United States between 2001 and 2004 that showed that teaching abstinence within a sex education class reduced sexual activity.

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