It wasn't until after the breathless passage of the health-care bill that we all noticed the $250 million set aside to restore abstinence-only education funding. The programs had been allowed to expire in 2010 by Obama, who instead started programs to prevent teenage pregnancy. The inclusion was especially odd because it was inserted by Republican Orrin Hatch, and didn't get his vote or, presumably, anyone's.
Education Week reports today that the other odd thing is that it will operate in conjunction with Obama's bigger, evidence-based programs to teach comprehensive sex ed and programs to prevent teenage pregnancy. The abstinence-only funding could have been allowed to stay in the health-care bill because it requires state matching funds, and since 22 states had already rejected the money for the programs because they didn't want to meet strict requirements, it's possible some of the money will sit unused over the next five years. It also could have been allowed to stay because of a recent study found that abstinence-only programs did a better job of delaying sex in African-American girls in middle school, but, as noted before, that program wouldn't have qualified for these funds because it just encouraged the girls to delay sexual activity until they were ready, not until they were married.
As I've noted before, we already knew that abstinence-only programs could delay sex among teens. The problem is that it doesn't necessarily mean they have safer sex or avoid pregnancy once they start having sex, which should really be the goal of all sex-education programs. As long as the harm from the abstinence-only program is minimized, it can die as slow a death as it wants.
-- Monica Potts