2008 Woodie Awards
No reason not to know: take advantage of STD testing
The Traveler Editorial Board
Issue date: 9/8/08 Section: Opinion
We all heard the findings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study released last March: one in four girls between ages 14 and 19 in the U.S. is infected with at least one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases.
Some of those diseases - like genital herpes - are incurable.
Some - like chlamydia - can lead to infertility.
And others - like human papillomavirus, which has infected nearly half of all sexually active people - are alarmingly common.
Scary stuff. Perhaps even more frightening is that the CDC reports many infected men and women are unaware of their conditions.
Take the "silent" chlamydia: about three-quarters of infected women and half of infected men show no symptoms at all.
The easiest - and most obvious - way UA students can try to "avoid the transmission of STDs is to abstain from sexual contact, or to be in a long-term mutually monogamous relationship with a partner who has been tested and is known to be uninfected," according to the CDC Web site.
Everyone knows that.
But for the many young adults who reject the abstinence-only method, some form of birth control - like latex, male condoms - is the next best option.
However, because condoms aren't 100 percent effective, and because oral contraceptives don't protect against STDs, sexually active students still face a risk of contracting an STD.
And everyone knows that, too.
But despite our knowledge of the frequency of STDs and the various means of prevention, not everyone is willing to get tested.
"While substantial progress has been made in preventing, diagnosing and treating certain STDs in recent years, [the] CDC estimates that approximately 19 million new infections occur each year, almost half of them among young people ages 15 to 24," according to the CDC 2006 Surveillance Report.
Some might credit people not getting tested to simply a lack of information, and others might blame apathy.
Some of those diseases - like genital herpes - are incurable.
Some - like chlamydia - can lead to infertility.
And others - like human papillomavirus, which has infected nearly half of all sexually active people - are alarmingly common.
Scary stuff. Perhaps even more frightening is that the CDC reports many infected men and women are unaware of their conditions.
Take the "silent" chlamydia: about three-quarters of infected women and half of infected men show no symptoms at all.
The easiest - and most obvious - way UA students can try to "avoid the transmission of STDs is to abstain from sexual contact, or to be in a long-term mutually monogamous relationship with a partner who has been tested and is known to be uninfected," according to the CDC Web site.
Everyone knows that.
But for the many young adults who reject the abstinence-only method, some form of birth control - like latex, male condoms - is the next best option.
However, because condoms aren't 100 percent effective, and because oral contraceptives don't protect against STDs, sexually active students still face a risk of contracting an STD.
And everyone knows that, too.
But despite our knowledge of the frequency of STDs and the various means of prevention, not everyone is willing to get tested.
"While substantial progress has been made in preventing, diagnosing and treating certain STDs in recent years, [the] CDC estimates that approximately 19 million new infections occur each year, almost half of them among young people ages 15 to 24," according to the CDC 2006 Surveillance Report.
Some might credit people not getting tested to simply a lack of information, and others might blame apathy.
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