Schools Moving to Comprehensive Sex Ed Two articles today detail pending changes for high school sex education and reproductive health care for students in Washington and Minnesota.

Washington’s Healthy Youth Act will take effect in the Fall in time for the start of the school year. 

The Healthy Youth Act was modeled after the
research of Douglas Kirby, an American research scientist who studied
and evaluated sex-education curricula from around the world. Kirby’s
research was sponsored by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen
Pregnancy in an effort to address alarming teen-sex statistics.

Based
on more than 115 program evaluations from around the world, Kirby’s
research found that curricula focusing on both abstinence and
contraception showed the most positive correlations in young adults.
Two-thirds of the time, teens exposed to this comprehensive approach
showed more willingness to delay sex and use contraception when they
were sexually active.

Abstinence-only programs showed no
improvements. Neither the frequency of sex nor the number of partners
went down. And those who were already sexually active showed no strong
evidence of returning to abstinence.

A school district in suburban Minnesota has given the go-ahead to allow a clinic offering contraception and STD testing to be located on its high school’s campus.  

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice Wants Gag Rule Ended Marjorie Singer, Director of Communications for the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, writes a good piece on AlterNet explaining the organization’s demand for the end of the Global Gag Rule in PEPFAR, along with other amendments:

Simply put, we want PEPFAR to be reauthorized and we welcome the
increased funds — but we want language restricting the participation
of family planning organizations to be removed.

This language
requires that organizations must comply with the global gag rule — the
requirement that foreign organizations receiving U.S. funding must not
provide abortion counseling or services or conduct advocacy on abortion
policy. We believe that an ethical policy will support the best and
most flexible approaches possible to contain the spread of HIV.
Experience shows that involving family planning organizations will
ensure the greatest level of access to information and services for women and girls.

We also are concerned by an onerous reporting provision in the bill
that would require Congress to be informed when countries with
generalized epidemics fall below 50 percent of funds spent on
abstinence and fidelity programs. Instead of promoting programs that
allow for flexibility and are tailored to the needs of individual
communities, the new reporting policy will restrict delivery of
comprehensive and integrated information.

Massachusetts Leads the Nation in Twins and Triplets The Boston Globe reports that "in a collision of science and demographics, Massachusetts has emerged as the
nation’s most prolific producer of twins, triplets, and other multiple
births."

The combination of an unusually large number of pregnancies in older women,
who are more likely to have multiples, and a heavy reliance on readily available
infertility treatments, which also increase the odds, has propelled
Massachusetts to the top: The state has a twin birth rate of 4.5 for every 100
live births, compared with a national rate of 3.2, according to the most recent
figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Breast Cancer Becoming a Marketing Tool You’ve likely heard of "greenwashing" — making a company look more environmentally friendly than it really is as a PR ploy — but Anne Landman warns of "pinkwashing" in an article published today at AlterNet.

Since 2002, the group Breast Cancer Action has promoted its "Think Before You
Pink" campaign. It’s fighting "pinkwashing," which is when corporations try to
boost sales by associating their products with the fight against breast cancer.
Pinkwashing is a form of slacktivism — a campaign that makes people feel like
they’re helping solve a problem, while they’re actually doing more to boost
corporate profits. Pinkwashing has been around for a while, but is now reaching
almost unbelievable levels.