Let's Give Our Kids All The Information They Need To Make Safe, Healthy Choices

Earlier today I had the privilege of testifying on the topic of abstinence-only education before my colleagues on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee at their hearing entitled "Domestic Abstinence-Only Programs: Assessing the Evidence." The subject of abstinence-only education and its ineffectiveness is one that I am very familiar with. Long before I entered the halls of Congress, I spent 20 years working in public schools as a school nurse and health educator.

My responsibilities then were to make decisions that best met the health needs of my students and school district, much as they are now to make decisions that best represent the needs of my constituents and the American people. As a public health nurse I always stressed prevention as the most important component of health education. Teaching young people about healthy behaviors, including the risks associated with unprotected sex and teen pregnancy, were important messages that needed to be conveyed.

I know from my firsthand experience what does and doesn't work with youth. That is why I promoted comprehensive health education for students, including information about reproduction and decision making associated with sex. Mitigating the risk of sexually transmitted disease and prevent pregnancy are important life skills teens must know. Withholding this information from them is doing a horrible disservice and one that runs contrary to my training and education as a public health nurse, which mandate that I always act in the best interests of my patients - in this case, my students.

I have been part of many curriculum review panels at both the school site and the school district level. These panels always included parents, teachers, administrators, board members and health professionals, such as pediatricians from the community.

As a school nurse, I also had the privilege of directing a program for pregnant and parenting teens which allowed them to stay in a regular high school with their peers. Part of this program was, of course, to provide day care for the babies of these young parents so that they could attend class. But more importantly, the teen parenting program provided education on life skills, with an emphasis on parenting, as well as education on how to prevent or delay further teen pregnancies. After all, teen parents are all too likely to have a second birth relatively soon - about one fourth of teenage mothers have a second child within 24 months of the first birth.

According to a 2005 CDC study, 46.8% of all high school students reported having had sexual intercourse. For high school seniors, this figure reaches 63.1%. The bottom line is, as much as parents and teachers alike stress abstinence among teens, sexual activity is a reality for many young people. So what can we do to confront this reality?

Some say that abstinence-only education is the answer. But claiming that the only proper information to share with teens, even teens who are already parents, is abstinence-only and nothing else, means withholding scientifically-based medical information. This is completely unrealistic.

Of course abstinence should be at the core of any comprehensive sexual education curriculum - practicing 100% complete abstinence is 100% effective in preventing pregnancy. For many young people, this message reinforces positive behaviors, but it is not realistic to expect such behavior from all teens. So the best thing we can do to protect young people from the negative consequences of unsafe sex is to give them the information they need. We know this works.

A National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy study revealed that over 40% of comprehensive education programs that were evaluated delayed the initiation of sex and more than ­60% reduced unprotected sex. Furthermore, no comprehensive program hastened the initiation of sex or increased the frequency of sex. Conversely, just last year, a federally-funded evaluation of the Title V abstinence-only programs conducted by Mathematica Policy Research Inc. found no evidence that these programs increased rates of sexual abstinence.

Over the past decade we have spent over 1.3 billion in Federal dollars on abstinence-only education, event though scientific study after scientific study has shown that these programs are ineffective and often contain false information. Given these findings and the limited financial resources available for public health programs, we should not invest a penny more of precious taxpayer dollars in programs that are clearly are failing to provide our kids with the information they need to make safe and healthy choices.

Instead we should be focusing our efforts - and our federal funding - on comprehensive approaches to sexual education that do work. That is why I am proud to be a cosponsor of legislation such as the Responsible Education About Life, or REAL Act and the Prevention First Act. It is in the best public health interest of our entire society to ensure that students are receiving scientifically and medically accurate information that will enable them to make the healthiest lifestyle decisions.

Here's the audio and video of Congresswoman Capps testifying on the topic of abstinence-only education before her colleagues on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee at their hearing, "Domestic Abstinence-Only Programs: Assessing the Evidence."

Congresswoman Lois Capps (D-CA) is a registered nurse who spent twenty years working as a public health educator in Santa Barbara area public schools. She now sits on the Energy and Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Health and serves as the Democratic Co-Chair of the Nursing Caucus and Congressional Caucus for Women's Issues.

Comments

[darker]

Safe and healthy choices?
did their voter parents make those by voting for Bush TWICE??
Idiots guiding the ignorant is the best we'll get in America.

[ThePhilosopher]

Absistinence-only education is ridiculous and inappropriate. The fact is that teens are going to have sex, period. They always have and always will. Instead of denying and ignoring this we need to be giving teens the tools needed to ensure that the sex they are having is as safe as possible. Teaching about contraception and other safe sex habits is important to reducing stds and unwanted pregnancies, teaching only absistence ensures that teens who still decide to have sex aren't going to know how to do so in the safest possible manner. It also totally ignores the many teens out there who are gay and therefore aren't deterred by the 'it prevents pregnancy' argument. Abstinence-only education is failing our kids, its time to own up to this and start teaching kids how to have sex in the safest possible way.

Also, as a side note, this whole absistence-only education assumes a certain moral position that many Americans don't agree with. There is nothing wrong with sex and its not immoral for young people to be engaging in it. Stop shoving this conservative ideology down our throats.

[PandeiroMan]

I was attending UCSB when Walter Capps made his run for congress. We were all saddened when he passed, but it is great to see Lois Capps continuing the good works in 2008 that Walter was so in favor of.

[blueraven]

Keep fighting the good fight, Rep. Capps. Teenagers aren't half as stupid as the educational system forces them to be.

[gonavy]

Abstinence only education is no education. That being said, who decides on what to teach and when? About a year ago a representative from CA tried to have homosexuality and transgender cirriculum taught in the social studies classes starting in 3rd. grade. They said it would be age appropriate. Someone please tell me how you talk about the history of these groups without explaining what homosexual and transgender are. The bill died, thank god, because I would have pulled 3 kids out of school and spent the next 15 years homeschooling.

[susieq1001]

Interesting question. All I know is that someone who is gay or transgender may start to realize at a VERY young age that they are different. If the children are exposed to someone like that, they see the difference and need explanations.

The son of a friend of mine started to say (at approximately age 7) that he wanted to be a girl. It was very clear that he was "different". It was very difficult. Both the adults and the children around him needed help in understanding him and accepting him.

[gonavy]

I understand that these are very difficult situations and , of coarse, at some point children need to know about the other life styles that people lead. I'm sitting here wondering what I would do if my son came home and told me about a friend who liked boys...and it's not an easy thing to answer.

[UnbiasView]

This is exactly what I'm more scared of with some of the liberals that are putting these things up for a vote.

[hopeless277]

Why don't we just put them all in military school until they're old enough to die in Iraq? If we don't do something then Iraq will invade and turn us all into mullahs. McCain/Clinton 08.

[indypete]

Excellent idea... fight them over there so we don't have condoms over here!