Center for AIDS Prevention Studies

About the author: The Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS), based at the University of California at San Francisco, conducts research and public outreach programs focusing on the prevention of AIDS.

The "abstinence only" approach to sex education—in which students are taught to abstain from sex and all discussion of condoms or safer sex is avoided—is inappropriate for the significant numbers of adolescents who choose to have sex. Sexually active young people need information on how to prevent pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Religious and political agendas, rather than public health needs, are driving government funding of abstinence education programs whose effectiveness has not been demonstrated in studies. Students should be encouraged to remain abstinent, but...