You are a high school health teacher and are presenting your lecture on STDs, AIDS, and safer sex practices. What information would be important to include in this lecture?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answer will include that a sexually-transmitted disease (STD) is an infection passed from one person to another by intimate physical contact. Sexually active people run a higher risk of becoming infected with chlamydia, gonorrhea, hepatitis B, herpes, syphilis, and other STDs. About three million new cases of chlamydia and gonorrhea are estimated to occur each year in the United States, only about half of which are reported. Despite such statistics, many sexually active people underestimate their risk for a variety of reasons. One study of sexually active teenage girls engaging in risky sex is a case in point. Nearly 90 percent of the girls thought that they had virtually no chance of getting an STD. In reality, over the next 18 months, one in four got chlamydia or gonorrhea. One reason for underestimating sexual risk is that people who are sexually active may have indirect contact with many other people. One study of sexual relationships at a high school in a Midwestern city found long chains of sexual contact between students. Thus, a student at the end of the chain might have had sex with only one person, but in reality she or he had indirect contact with dozens or even hundreds of others. Another reason is that many people who carry STDs remain asymptomatic (lacking obvious symptoms). It is easy to have an infection without knowing it. Likewise, it is often impossible to tell whether a sexual partner is infectious. Also, because most of the more common STDs are treatable, it is easy to dismiss their impact on health. But STDs such as chlamydia or gonorrhea produce a variety of painful and embarrassing symptoms. Chlamydia can even "silently" (without symptoms) damage a woman's reproductive organs, resulting in infertility. Gonorrhea can damage the fertility of both men and women. Behavioral risk factors should be presented, such as multiple partners, having unprotected sex, sharing needles, etc. and safer sex practices, such as not having sex, using a condom, and not engaging in sex while intoxicated. Information and statistics to be presented regarding AIDS might include the following: (a) how it is transmitted (blood and fluids) and how it is not (casual contact, such as social kissing, sharing drinking glasses, etc.); (b) that HIV can be spread by all forms of sexual intercourse and has affected persons of all sexual orientations. Almost thirty percent of new HIV infections in the United States are transmitted through heterosexual sex. (c) that AIDS has a long incubation period of 10 years, so infected persons often pass it on without knowing it; (d) that one can test negative for HIV six months after becoming infected with 25 percent of HIV infected individuals being unaware of their infections; (e) statistics, such as the United States now has 1.2 million people infected (of whom one quarter are women) and each passing year adds about 50,000 new cases. Safer sex practices include (1) Not having sex, (2) Sex with one mutually faithful, uninfected partner, (3) Using a condom, (4) Discussing contraception with partner, (5) Discussing partner's sexual health prior to engaging in sex, (6) Being selective regarding sexual partners, (7) Reducing the number of sexual partners, (8) Not engaging in sex while intoxicated, and (9) Not injecting drugs (one type of transmission of HIV/AIDS). Taking precautions could be defined as a way of showing that you really care about your own health as well as that of your partner.