UH 370 what?: March 2010

In light of our current healthcare issues regarding abortion, I thought I’d address sexual education. Most, if not all of us, have all had some sort of the “birds and the bees” talk, whether from school, parents, friends, or Cosmopolitan magazine. The differences in the way we view sex, sexual behavior, and the consequences of that behavior is a hot global issue.

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When I was in high school way back when, my form of sexual education could be compared more or less to the health class in the movie “Mean Girls” when the health teacher just told the class not to have sex until marriage. Fortunately, in 2008, the state of Washington passed a comprehensive sex education law that required schools to teach medically accurate information about preventing pregnancies and STDs. This consequently led to the Bush Administration cutting off funding to the state of Washington for abstinence-only sex education. According to Planned Parenthood, several states also denied abstinence-only sexual education funding (1).

Sexually transmitted diseases are a major issue and only continue to increase, especially in developing areas. According to the World Health Organization, about 15% of Zimbabwe’s adult population had HIV in 2007, with a current life expectancy of around 43 years (2). In Colombia the number of people living with HIV has increased from less than 20,000 in 1990 to over 150,000 in 2007 (3). The answer to the question of how and why STDs are so prevalent in developing is more complex than sexually educating youth beyond family and community teachings, but proper sexual education could be a key step in relieving the problem.

Designing sex education programs that can fit into a culture is a challenge, especially when that culture does not address or does not want to address sex. North Africa and the Middle East populations are predominantly Islamic, and do not support premarital sex. This collection of cultures also looks at the HIV epidemic as a result of sexual immorality, resulting in leaders denying that such a problem exists in their countries. Although UNAIDS reported only 0.2% of this region to be infected with HIV/AIDS, there is question as to how accurate the statistics are due to the negative light that is shed on people living with the disease. Possible ways of incorporating sexual education into Islam culture is to emphasize that Islam acknowledges sexual desires. These sexual desires are to be fulfilled, and their Prophet welcomes open discussion on sexual health. There probably are more specifics involved, but these basic concepts can be used to promote safe sexual activity (4).