HIGHLAND Regional Council may have to consider making condoms
available in its secondary schools following results of a survey into
the lifestyles of the region's fourth- year pupils.
The survey, published yesterday, showed that 39% of pupils in S4 have
already had sexual intercourse, that for one in five of these it had
first happened when they were 12 or 13, and that pupils in rural areas
are more embarrassed about buying condoms locally.
Strathclyde University's Centre for Social Marketing was commissioned
jointly by the region and Highland Health Board to research the
lifestyles of 661 fourth-year pupils at 13 of the region's 27 secondary
schools in both urban and rural settings.
The findings are to be used to help develop teaching packages warning
of the dangers of unprotected sex, and drug misuse.
The report, Lifestyle and HIV/Aids: A study of young people in
Highland 1992-1993, found that 75% of the sample said they had used
contraception on the first occasion of sexual intercourse, with 91%
using condoms, 16% the pill, and 3% withdrawal.
Around 66% said they recognised that having sex without a condom with
someone from outwith the local area provided a large risk of
transmitting HIV/Aids. This awareness was second only to the 92% who
recognised the dangers in sharing needles while injecting drugs.
Despite attaching such importance to condoms, when asked about sources
of free condoms, 20% answered ''Nowhere -- Cannot get free condoms'',
23% didn't know, and 10% made no answer.
Ms Anne Marie MacKintosh and Mr Douglas Eadie, the report's authors,
said the overall results were largely the same as national trends. They
did, however, highlight the significant rural-urban difference that 51%
of the pupils sampled in rural areas claimed that free condoms were not
available in their area, compared with 18% of urban respondents.
The pupils were also asked about being embarrassed buying condoms, 69%
said that they would be very embarrassed or quite embarrassed about
buying them at their local shop, 67% at their local garage, and 52%
obtaining condoms from their local doctor. Again, there was greater
embarrassment, 15%, about buying condoms in rural areas.
At the publication of the report in Inverness yesterday, Highland
Health Board member Mrs Caroline Thomson, who chairs the board's harm
reduction committee, was asked whether, in the light of these figures,
it might not be more helpful to make condoms available in schools.
She replied: ''Yes it would be but we can appreciate the sensitivities
and I think the education department is working very hard to this end. I
think it would be the answer but what we must do is to look for the
support of parents and teachers and ask these young people what it is
they actually require.
''A lot of these 15-year-olds are very emotionally mature, they will
take a conscious decision to commence a sexual relationship, are
responsible and have thought about it and known their partners for some
time. We would want to make access to condoms as easy as possible for
all these reasons.''
Mrs Val MacIver, chairwoman of the region's education committee, said:
''I think this is something that has to be debated within the authority
and parent groups, and school boards.
''If you commission a report and look at the results of it and say
that's fine and put it away in a drawer, that's the easy option.
''But the reason for commissioning the report was to find out what is
actually happening and there is no doubt to my mind, as one individual
member of the council, that we do have a problem, and it is a problem
that has to be addressed sooner rather than later, not just by the
education authority but by the parents as well.
''I would emphasise that it has to be done in a partnership between
the council, the health board, and the parents.''
Mrs MacIver said the education department had already taken account of
the figures, which showed that sexual experience can begin in S1 and S2,
and had revamped HIV/Aids teaching materials, originally designed for S3
and S4, so that they could be used in the earlier years.
Increasing availability of condoms has always been condemned by
Highland Churches, which have long held that chastity before and
fidelity during marriage are the only way to tackle the spread of Aids.
However, at yesterday's launch, Highland Aids officer Brian Devlin
said: ''I think that one of the worst things we can do just now is call
out the moral cavalry, because there is no easy moral answer.''
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