Because of rising Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI) rates, some local governments are planning on instituting some new policies. From The Daily Women’s Health Report:
Washington, D.C., officials are planning to make testing for sexually transmitted infections available at all public high schools in the coming school year, adding D.C. to a growing list of cities that test students for STIs….
he new program requires all students to attend a lecture about STIs, after which they are escorted into restroom areas in groups of 15 to 20. They are then given paper bags with urine collection cups and go into the stalls, at which point they can decide whether to provide a sample. All students return the paper bags, regardless of whether they provided samples. Students give a password and can call a week later to receive their confidential results and, if necessary, treatment at the school or an STI clinic, which is paid for by the city. The district first offered the program two years ago at two charter schools, and eight high schools were included during the past school year.
Also from The Women’s Health Report, news from Boston:
Boston’s health agency on Tuesday is scheduled to launch a safer-sex campaign that reaches out to teenagers through Web sites such as Facebook and YouTube, the Boston Globe reports. The campaign was created in response to rising rates of sexually transmitted infections among young people in the city, according to the Globe. The $100,000 campaign originally was intended to address communicable diseases in general. However, experts noticed the increase in STI cases among teenagers and decided to spend all the funding on the campaign targeting STIs.
