October is National Family Sexuality Education Month

October is National Family Sexuality Education Month, and what better way to honor it than to celebrate comprehensive sexuality education! This year, we’re celebrating the Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), which allows schools and educators to do just that-- provide comprehensive, medically-accurate, age-appropriate sex education!

PREP provides $55 million for states to provide evidence-based sex education on:

• Pregnancy prevention
• Abstinence
• Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) prevention
• Responsible decision-making
• Healthy relationships
  

With an estimated 750,000 unplanned teen pregnancies and 4 million new STI transmissions among teens per year, it is clear that these topics need to be addressed. Pregnancy and STIs are 100% preventable and providing youth with factual, age-appropriate information is the first step in prevention.

Numerous studies have shown that comprehensive sex education can help kids abstain from sex, increase contraceptive use, and reduce teen pregnancies. And, we know that abstinence-only messages don’t work. Planned Parenthood of Delaware, along with teens and parents everywhere, are using Sex Ed Month to applaud Congress and the Obama administration for taking the first step toward protecting the health of the nation’s youth and empowering them to make good decisions for their bodies.

Need an excuse to bring up this sometimes tough topic? Take a peek at the Planned Parenthood list of upcoming workshops for the fall!