City high school students in San Francisco already have access to free condoms. Now, a proposal introduced to the school board would authorize condoms to be handed out to middle school students following a one-on-one information session with a school nurse or social worker.
According to the San Francisco Examiner, the policy change was introduced by San Francisco Unified School District Superintendent Richard Carranza to the Board of Education earlier this month, as part of an overall effort by the district to further prevent sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy among minors.
Each one-on-one session would also include information about the risks and effectiveness associated with condom use as well as letting students, including the minors in middle school, know that abstinence is the only 100 percent effective way to prevent unwanted pregnancy or STDs.
The San Francisco Chronicle points to student surveys conducted by the district showing that at least five percent of students in sixth, seventh and eighth grades have had sexual intercourse, and more than a quarter of high school students report having had sex.
The new proposal will likely face a vote next month. If it passes, it would reportedly also take away the ability of high school parents to opt their high schoolers out of the program, although they would still received an annual notification about it. The same would also apply to parents of middle school children.
“As the (sexually transmitted disease) controller in San Francisco, I know all too well that San Francisco has among the highest rates of chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis of any city in the United States,” Dr. Susan Philip, reportedly said in a letter endorsing the proposal on behalf of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. “Condoms are highly effective prevention against STDs, HIV and unwanted pregnancy.
A nurse at Herbert Hoover Middle School in San Francisco refused to comment on the new initiative, saying she had “no opinion” on the matter and directed Breitbart News to speak with SFUSD’s School Health Programs Department, which then said all calls form the media should be made to the district’s communications office’s public relations manager.
She was unavailable for comment at the time.
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