New Study -- Same Result! Comprehensive Sex Education Works

WASHINGTON, March 26 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Adolescents receiving
comprehensive sex education had a substantially lower risk of teenage
pregnancy than students who received either abstinence-only education or no
education at all, according to a new, groundbreaking study published in the
Journal of Adolescent Health.

The study, conducted by Pamela K. Kohler, M.P.H., Lisa E. Manhart, Ph.D., and
William E. Lafferty, M.D., also concluded that teaching about contraception
did not increase sexual activity or sexually transmitted diseases.

"The sexual health statistics in America are alarming," said Debra Hauser,
executive vice president of Advocates for Youth. "We know that 1 in 4 teen
girls have a sexually transmitted disease, that the HIV rate among African
American young men who have sex with men has increased by 80 percent, and that
the teen birth rate has increased for the first time in fourteen years."

"We must, absolutely must, stop censoring sexual health information about
contraception and condoms and start investing in programs that we know work,"
concluded Hauser. "The blame for these negative health statistics rests
squarely with this Administration's push for ineffective
abstinence-only-until-marriage programs."

To date, seventeen states -- Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Iowa,
Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York,
Ohio, Rhode Island, Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming -- have rejected federal
Title V abstinence-only-until-marriage funding for these failed programs.

In addition, over the last ten years, a number of other reports and studies
have sent clear signals that funding abstinence-only-until-marriage programs
was wrong:

-- Late last year, Doug Kirby, a leading researcher in adolescent health,
issued a report Emerging Answers 2007: Research Findings on Programs to Reduce
Teen Pregnancy and Sexually Transmitted Disease, that concluded "there does
not exist any strong evidence that any abstinence program delays the
initiation of sex, hastens the return to abstinence, or reduces the number of
sexual partners."

-- In April 2007, a 10-year government-mandated study conducted by Mathematica
Policy Research, Inc. showed that abstinence-only-until-marriage programs did
not impact teen behavior.

-- In 2006, the Society for Adolescent Medicine (SAM) called the programs
"scientifically and ethically flawed" and found that the "efficacy of
abstinence-only interventions may approach zero."

-- In 2000, the Institute of Medicine stated that the abstinence-only policy
was "poor fiscal and public health policy" and recommended that the programs
be stopped.

Advocates for Youth is a national organization that promotes programs and
advocates for policies that help young people make informed and responsible
decisions about their reproductive and sexual health.

SOURCE Advocates for Youth

Marcela Howell of Advocates for Youth, +1-202-419-3420, cell: +1-202-841-3292