Unfortunately, as I heard on talkback radio recently, sex seems to have become just a physical act between two people, as a result of basic natural urges.
Yet, while the Government debates increasing the drinking age back to 20 because our teens seem to lack the maturity to handle alcohol responsibly, nobody seems to flinch at the fact that regional Chlamydia and gonorrhoea rates in New Zealand are around three times higher than they are in Australia and the UK.(1) And what’s worse, according to The New Zealand Medical Journal, is that those most affected and most infected are 15 to 19-year-old girls.(2)
Dr Miriam Grossman, the author of You’re Teaching my Child What? A Physician Exposes the Lies of Sex Education and How They Harm your Child, says the reality is that politically correct agendas reign while the health and well-being of our children take a back seat.(3)
AVERT, the international Aids charity, tells us that, “sexually transmitted diseases are a major global cause of acute illness, infertility, long-term disability and death, with severe medical and psychological consequences for millions of men, women and children”.
They even quote the World Health Organisation, which says that, “In developing countries, STDs and their complications are amongst the top five disease categories for which adults seek health care. In women of childbearing age, STDs (excluding HIV) are second only to maternal factors as causes of disease, death and healthy life lost”.(4)
So it would seem that when you do stop to look past the politically correct rhetoric on the issue, there is a very strong case for our political leaders and community advocates to call our teens to abstinence. But it would seem that none cares enough to do it.
(1) Taken from The STI Handbook, published by Best Practice Advocacy Centre, an independent organisation that promotes health-care interventions which meet patients’ needs and are evidence based, cost effective and suitable for the New Zealand context.
(2) Dr Miriam Grossman, quoted in an upcoming interview I have recorded for Talk@10 on NZ’s Rhema.
(3) The New Zealand Medical Journal, 11 March 2005, Vol 118, No 1211.
(4) www.avert.org/stdstatisticsworldwide.htm.
