The Lancet Medical Journal Editorial: Sexual Health Study “Should Be Headline News”

[Abu-Salman]

Editorial

 

 

Teenagers with grown-up diseases

 

 

Last week, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that more than one in four teenage girls in the USA has a sexually transmitted disease (STD). This jaw-dropping news was exceeded only by data showing that African-Americans are even more severely affected: nearly half (48%, compared with 20% in young white women) are infected with human papillomavirus (HPV), chlamydia, herpes simplex virus, or trichomoniasis. Around 3·2 million American girls aged 14–19 years have an STD, with the most common disease being HPV (affecting 18%), followed by chlamydia, which accounts for 4% of infections.

 

The study, presented at the 2008 National STD Prevention Conference, used data from the 2003–04 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. It is the first documentation of the combined national prevalence in adolescent girls of the most common STDs.

 

The findings are especially chilling in view of the devastating long-term effects of untreated STDs, which include infertility and cervical cancer. The findings also vividly show that prevention measures have failed. Prevention, however, is a life or death matter, and a more pressing priority than ever.

 

Obviously, doctors who take care of adolescent girls need to take on board this new reality. But the high prevalence of STDs in teenagers is not just a clinical concern, it is a societal wake-up call. As Hilary Pert Stecklein, a paediatrician in Minnesota, observed, this study “should be headline news”. Her solution is three-pronged. First, children must be educated about pregnancy prevention. Second, they must understand the reality of STDs—that they can cause long-term silent damage, and that they can be fatal. Third, they need to be seriously engaged in conversation about whether they are emotionally ready for sexual relationships, and whether they have the strength and maturity to make the right decisions for their health and their future.

 

Assessing judgment and maturity is at least as crucial as the provision of methods of birth control, and not only for individual children. As the American psychiatrist Karl Menninger said, “What we do to children, they will do to society”.

 

 

The Lancet

[Ibtisam]

Why does this shock/suprise you?

[Abu-Salman]

What is more shocking, Large-Scale Depravation or Constantly Re-inventing the Wheel, Thus Squandering Ressources on Redundant Studies Instead of Focusing On Diseases Which Kill Millions Every Year?

 

Just By Concentrating On Cancers, Metabolic Syndrome (which include Type 2 Diabete), Cardio-Vascular diseases, Arthritis, STDs or Alcohol related pathologies like Liver Cirrosis (rare transplants, the only cure, are spared for more deserving patients), One could easily have a glimpse On how Western Materialism and the acculturateds are eating, drinking, fornicating, and "entertaining" themselves into early grave preceded By easily avoidable disability and physical As Well As Mental suffering, not without destroying poor communities worldwide And ruining our collective environment in the meantime, wether it be through unjust trade, Sky-rocketting obscenes "Debts" through proxy regime (not mentioning unprecedented inflation which litteraly starve entire countries as cereals are turned into "biofuels")...

[Cara.]

If the UK is considering their options on protecting teenagers, the LAST thing they should do is emulate the United States. Teen pregnancy and STD rates have been steadily decreasing until the current administration instituted their ideology-driven abstinence-only sex ed. They replaced comprehensive and realistic education on the dangers of unprotected sex with covering their ears and screaming "you will make Baby Jesus cry if you do the nasty!"

[Ibtisam]

you will make Baby Jesus cry if you do the nasty!"

HAHA lool.

 

I met for the first time someone who is in one of these abstinence organisations, they have 300 members and have a good support system going. I had a bet of how long she will last.

[Cara.]

You say "had". How much did you win

[Ibtisam]

^^^ You are too fast dee yaa Cara.

[Jacpher]

^You two are not advocating for promiscuous culture, I hope. What's wrong with obstinance?

[Ibtisam]

^^^WHo me?? lol. I just found it funny that a someone who does not have a reason other than because they feel like self imposed abstinence thinks they will master the self control to follow thorough. The ones who have a reason (religion, culture etc) have a hard time as it is, let alone those who just feel like doing it for the sake of not having sex. I just don't think it is possible. Someone needs a solid reason to justify something like that and follow it.

 

I'm advocating for protection, one way or another.

[Koora-Tuunshe]

Originally posted by Abu-Salman:

What is more shocking, Large-Scale Depravation or Constantly Re-inventing the Wheel, Thus Squandering Ressources on Redundant Studies Instead of Focusing On Diseases Which Kill Millions Every Year?

 

Just By Concentrating On Cancers, Metabolic Syndrome (which include Type 2 Diabete), Cardio-Vascular diseases, Arthritis, STDs or Alcohol related pathologies like Liver Cirrosis (rare transplants, the only cure, are spared for more deserving patients), One could easily have a glimpse On how Western Materialism and the acculturateds are eating, drinking, fornicating, and "entertaining" themselves into early grave preceded By easily avoidable disability and physical As Well As Mental suffering, not without destroying poor communities worldwide And ruining our collective environment in the meantime, wether it be through unjust trade, Sky-rocketting obscenes "Debts" through proxy regime (not mentioning unprecedented inflation which litteraly starve entire countries as cereals are turned into "biofuels")...

You sound more like Rev. Wright and his pathological fear and distrust for the west particularly America.

 

You mixing up too many things to make a monstrous picture of them