LONDON, December 1, 2006  –  Fifty-eight per cent of gay teens have sex before the age of 16, the annual Puffta love-sex-life survey has revealed

And the government is failing to educate teens about sex at the right age and in the right communities.

The recent Department of Health (DH) campaign to make condoms ‘essential wear’ for young people had the following brief: “To normalise condom use and tackle growing rates of sexually transmitted infections among 18 to 24-year-olds who are complacent about unprotected sex”.

And 35% of those responding to the survey said that they had unprotected sex in the past three months.

However, the love-se-.life survey revealed 58% of gay teens had sex before the legal age of 16, and 23% had sex at 13-years-old or younger.

“Last year and the year before the results were shocking we simply didn't know what this age group were up to as nobody had asked them, Simon Johnson, editor and founder of puffta.co.uk said last night.

“Now, year after year we’re finding a running trend that gay teens are having unprotected sex and not getting tested for STDs and HIV – yet they’re very sexually active at such a young age.”

Mr. Johnson said he doesn’t believe the recent mainstream Government campaigns go far enough to educate straight or gay teens,

“The campaign is not inclusive.  Why spend so much money on a campaign that only targets young straight people and only focus on two STDs?  You can cure chlamydia and gonorrhoea but you can’t cure HIV.

“Only recently the COI (Central Office of Information) commissioned other campaigns to be developed by Delaney Lund Knox Warren (DLKW), the same agency who has developed the “essential wear” campaign.

“These have included ‘the fight against unwanted pregnancies’ and the viral marketing campaign ‘12 STIs of Christmas’ which all point to one website geared totally towards a straight audience.

“If the DH has the money to spend on agencies and primetime slots on television it should be including all groups and not relying on charities such as the THT and Crusaid to pick up its slack,” he said.

■  Puffta’s annual survey polled gay teens about sex, love and life.  Nearly 500 teens between 13 and 21 logged on to Puffta and answered questions about safe sex and drugs.  Click HERE for the full survey report.

■  The Schools Out group, which is working towards equality  in education for LGBT, called on the government last night to totally rethink its sex education and HIV awareness.

LINKS

		website
		website