Virginity rare, drug use common with US-adults

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Study: virginity rare, drug use common in adults

Sat Jun 23, 2007

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Just 4 percent of U.S. adults are virgins but a fifth have tried hard drugs like cocaine and crack, a new study shows.

What most alarms researchers is how young they start.

"We still have a public health problem in that we still see a lot of adults reporting their sexual debut at a pretty young age," said Dr. Kathryn Porter of the National Center for Health Statistics, who led the survey of more than 6,000 people.

"That is an area of concern because risky sexual behaviors can result in sexually transmitted diseases and unintended pregnancies," she said in a telephone interview.

Ninety-six percent of U.S. adults aged between 20 and 59 have engaged in some kind of sex, including oral and anal sex, according to the study published on Friday.

The researchers believe they have one of the most honest assessments yet of sexual behavior and drug use because they used a new method to do the survey, which is available on the Internet at http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ad/ad384.pdf.

"They answered this in complete privacy," Porter said.

"They have a headset on, they touch a computer screen. This is the first time we just looked at statistics for sexual behavior and drug use alone."
There were no surprises, Porter said, but what researchers already know is troubling.

"Among non-Hispanic blacks, 28 percent reported having first had sex before the age of 15," she said.

The number was 14 percent for whites.

"It seems we still have areas to kind of work on," Porter said.

MULTIPLE PARTNERS

The survey, done between 1999 and 2002, also showed 46 percent of black men said they had 15 or more sexual partners in a lifetime.

Overall, 17 percent of men and 10 percent of women said they had two or more sexual partners in the past year. The younger a person was, the more likely they were to have had multiple partners.

The survey found Mexican-Americans were the most likely to report never having had any form of sex, with 24 percent of men and 45 percent of women in that group claiming to be virgins.

For all men, the median number of sexual partners was 6.8.
"If you ask women, it is less -- it is 3.7," Porter said.

A history of drug use was most common among middle-aged adults.

More than 19 percent of those aged 20 to 29 said they had tried cocaine, crack or another street drug, excluding marijuana. This rose to 27 percent for people aged 30 to 39 and nearly 26 percent for those in their 40s.

But just 9.6 percent of those aged 50 to 59 acknowledged having ever tried street drugs.

"That number might be different if we had included marijuana," Porter said.

"When you look at the overall prevalence of adults ever having used one (street drug), it is still over 20 percent. That is a lot more than I would have thought

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But just 9.6 percent of those aged 50 to 59 acknowledged having ever tried street drugs.

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How soon we forget...

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:wink:

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And the incidence of autism continues to rise...

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Why is it so troubling about Americans having their first sex before they're 15? Humans reach sexual maturity at the age of 12. So they'll start wanting to sleep with one another when they're 12, period. Sure, grown-ups have to prepare their children for this by including decent sex education in their biology curriculum and by persuading them to use condoms. But why is the mere fact of early teenage sex so troubling?

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Teens don't understand the consequences of their pre-marital sex.
Thus, we have teen girls giving birth to babies in the bathrooms of high schools and then disposing of the babies in the garbage can situated next to the bus stop.

One such baby was alive at the time the garbage collectors were just getting ready to toss the bag into the garbage smasher.

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Miller wrote:

Teens don't understand the consequences of their pre-marital sex.

It seems to me that schools can solve this problem easily enough. All they have to do is teach teens about sex and its consequences. In my school, we had sexual education in sixth grade. If I'd had a girlfriend at the time, we would have known how not to make her pregnant. Had she gotten pregnant anyway, we would have known what our options were, and whom to turn to about them.

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Thomas, getting a school district to approve anything other than an abstinence only health curriculum is mostly fantasy. What you suggest is a case of a solution that is likely to succeed, but unlikely to be implemented.

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Sex and drugs are just as alive here as in the states. As far as sex is concerned, I've noticed a major change in the majority of todays young girls. Today it seems that they decided that what's good for the goose is good for the gander and the girls have come to look at sex the same way the boys have always looked at it, like it's no big deal.

Personally, I think it's sad.

Just my opinion, of course.

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JPB wrote:

Thomas, getting a school district to approve anything other than an abstinence only health curriculum is mostly fantasy. What you suggest is a case of a solution that is likely to succeed, but unlikely to be implemented.

Okay, that does it. JPB, if I should ever have children, please remind me not to put them into an American public school.

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Thomas wrote:

JPB wrote:
Thomas, getting a school district to approve anything other than an abstinence only health curriculum is mostly fantasy. What you suggest is a case of a solution that is likely to succeed, but unlikely to be implemented.

Okay, that does it. JPB, if I should ever have children, please remind me not to put them into an American public school.

I have a better idea. If you have children here in the States, join the PTA and become a vocal proponent of sex education in the schools. At the same time, be sure you educate your own children re: sex.

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Well, Thomas, you could enroll them in public schools and a UUA/UCC OWL program.

Quote:

Our Whole Lives is based on the philosophy of comprehensive sexuality education, which helps participants make informed and responsible decisions about their sexual health and behavior. It equips participants with accurate, age-appropriate information in six subject areas: human development, relationships, personal skills, sexual behavior, sexual health, and society and culture. Grounded in a holistic view of sexuality, comprehensive sexuality education provides not only facts about anatomy and human development, but support for participants to clarify their values, integrate sexual and spiritual understandings, build interpersonal skills, and understand the spiritual, emotional, social, and political aspects of sexuality.

Our Whole Lives was developed in response to the need expressed by congregations in the Unitarian Universalist Association and the United Church of Christ for high-quality, lifespan sexuality education resources. Both denominations have a proud tradition that calls us to take an active role in the promotion of education and justice in human sexuality. Our Whole Lives offers United Church of Christ and Unitarian Universalist participants of all ages a profound opportunity to deepen their faith and put their values into practice. The curricula promote sexual, spiritual, and emotional health in our communities and foster meaningful dialogue between peers, partners, families, and friends.

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Swimpy wrote:

I have a better idea. If you have children here in the States, join the PTA and become a vocal proponent of sex education in the schools.

What, and advance the common good? Do I look like Mother Theresa to you? Wink

Okay, now I'll have to learn what all those acronyms mean. I've got OWL down, and PTA, UUA/UCC, to decipher. I'll be back.

Edit: UUA/UCC is clear now too. Sounds like an interesting program. How is it organized? Something like Unitarian Sunday school for teenagers?

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It has components that can be part of the on-going RE program. Most programs use the teen component, some programs use the earlier models as well.

Quote:

Our Whole Lives covers topics and skills that both parents and students want to have available but schools are less likely to cover. The Kaiser Family Foundation has an interesting report on this subject called "Sex Education in America: A View from Inside the Nation's Classrooms." New national surveys are challenging the convention that Americans are reluctant to have sexual health issues taught in school, the surveys show that most parents, along with educators and students themselves, would expand sex education courses and curriculum.
The Our Whole Lives Values:

* Self Worth
* Sexual Health
* Responsibility
* Justice and Inclusivity

Each level of Our Whole Lives offers:

* up-to-date information and honest, age-appropriate answers to all participants' questions
* activities to help participants clarify values and improve decision-making skills
* effective group-building to create a safe and supportive peer group
* education about sexual abuse, exploitation, and harassment
* opportunities to critique media messages about gender and sexuality
* acceptance of diversity
* encouragement to act for justice
* a well designed, teacher-friendly leaders' guide
* parent orientation programs that affirm parents as the primary sexuality educators of their children

Our Whole Lives is appropriate for use in a variety of congregational, school, and community settings, including classrooms, after-school programs, and youth groups. Although developed by two religious organizations, Our Whole Lives contains no religious references or doctrine.
OWL

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Quoting from the article,

"We still have a public health problem in that we still see a lot of adults reporting their sexual debut at a pretty young age," said Dr. Kathryn Porter of the National Center for Health Statistics, who led the survey of more than 6,000 people.

"That is an area of concern because risky sexual behaviors can result in sexually transmitted diseases and unintended pregnancies," she said in a telephone interview.

This seems to me to be a lot of whining about human nature. The numbers don't astound me. The second sentence is bothersome to me because of what it doesn't seem to cotton on to, that education about risks and ways to alter risk - other than total abstinence - is vital. Keeping people who are past puberty ignorant of information is a kind of cruelty to me. That is the public health risk.

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I agree, Osso. Especially since the first paragraph you quote:

Quote:

"We still have a public health problem in that we still see a lot of adults reporting their sexual debut at a pretty young age," said Dr. Kathryn Porter of the National Center for Health Statistics, who led the survey of more than 6,000 people.

... lacks any logical connection to the second:

Quote:

"That is an area of concern because risky sexual behaviors can result in sexually transmitted diseases and unintended pregnancies," she said in a telephone interview.

Risky sexual behaviors foster STDs and unintended pregnancies. Safer sex avoids STDs and unintended pregnancies. Both points are true regardless of the practicioners' age. The second paragraph is an argument for safer sex, not for barring sex from young people.

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Yes, I found that second sentence a stunning nonsequitur.

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Thomas wrote:

Why is it so troubling about Americans having their first sex before they're 15? Humans reach sexual maturity at the age of 12. So they'll start wanting to sleep with one another when they're 12, period. Sure, grown-ups have to prepare their children for this by including decent sex education in their biology curriculum and by persuading them to use condoms. But why is the mere fact of early teenage sex so troubling?

I've done my darndest to teach my 13 year old son to take out the trash every Sunday night. You know I have to tell him every Sunday night to take out the trash. And Monday after school he walks right by the empty trashcans without bringing them back in.

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martybarker wrote:

I've done my darndest to teach my 13 year old son to take out the trash every Sunday night. You know I have to tell him every Sunday night to take out the trash. And Monday after school he walks right by the empty trashcans without bringing them back in.

So?

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I think it's extremely important for us parents to teach our children about sex, diseases and pregnancy when they are young and before they decide to learn on their own.
I could never understands what sex ed was doing in the schools. It's a very personal and private issue for some people and I personally didn't appreciate the schools teaching my son whatever the hell they felt like.
For example, they asked the kids how they knew if they were gay or not if they never tried it. Duh, you just know, from what I'm told from past and present gay friends.
I don't have the time to get into all the nasty stuff they are teaching young children in the schools in Massachusetts, but it was enough to make me sick to my stomache.

Anyway, my view is that I still think all parents should have many talks with their kids about sex, but in all reality, they are little humans who will follow that sexual urge, so the best thing we can hope for is that that use that protection I know I drilled into my son about a million times and am still drilling.

So far no grandchildren :-D

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Virginity rare, drug use common with US-adults

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