It’s Not Sex Education If You Don’t Talk About Sex…

It’s not sex education if you don’t talk about sex, and STIs won’t be prevented if scientifically-based discussions on prevention are prohibited. But before CDC's National STD Prevention Conference next week has even begun, the research-based, biannual meeting has been commandeered by anti-sex education ideologues.

According to Slate Magazine, “The conference was supposed to include a symposium designed to explore how abstinence-only sex education may undermine other efforts to reduce STDs.”

It’s not sex education if you don’t talk about sex, and STIs won’t be prevented if scientifically-based discussions on prevention are prohibited. But before CDC's National STD Prevention Conference next week has even begun, the research-based, biannual meeting has been commandeered by anti-sex education ideologues.

According to Slate Magazine, “The conference was supposed to include a symposium designed to explore how abstinence-only sex education may undermine other efforts to reduce STDs.”

Despite being accepted through a rigorous, peer-review process, the original workshop titled, "Are Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Programs a Threat to Public Health?" was scrapped and replaced with "Public Health Strategies of Abstinence Programs for Youth." With only one week to go before the conference, the original moderator and a panelist from SIECUS (a pro-sex education organization) have been replaced with “two staunch proponents of abstinence-only education.”

The culprit? Fingers are pointing at Indiana Congressman Mark Souder (R-IN).

As Slate’s contributor writes, “This is bad news, not only because abstinence-only work is scientifically unfounded but also because the switch represents a new level of government intrusion into the peer-review process of a major scientific meeting.”

Read John Santelli’s (remaining panelist from Columbia's School of Public Health) position paper on abstinence-only education.

For more on effective sex education visit the Guttmacher Institute and Advocates For Youth.