25% Of Teenage Girls Have An STD

Boston Globe:

About 1 in 4 teenage girls in the United States - and nearly half of black girls - has at least one sexually transmitted disease, according to a study released yesterday, providing the first national snapshot of infection rates among this age group.

Those numbers translate into an estimated 3.2 million adolescent females infected with one of the four most common STDs - many of whom may not even know they have a disease or that they are passing it to their sex partners.

"What we found is alarming," said Dr. Sara Forhan, a researcher with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the study's lead author. "This means that far too many young women are at risk for the serious health effects of untreated STDs, including infertility and cervical cancer."

The study's authors analyzed data on 838 girls between ages 14 and 19 who participated in the 2003-04 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, an annual study that assesses a broad range of health issues. For the analysis, the teens were tested for human papillomavirus (HPV), chlamydia, trichomoniasis, and herpes. By far, the most common sexually transmitted disease was HPV. Of those infected, 15 percent had more than one STD.

Now I know that liberals just shrug their shoulders to this sort of thing with the blase attitude of "they're going to have sex anyway". And I know that abstinence education is a all-too dangerous concept that must be kept away from our kids at all costs. But considering Eliot Spitzer's resignation yesterday amidst word coming out that he spent like $80,000+ on hookers for the last 10 or so years. I can't help but guess that the Governor's favorite hooker, 22-year-old "Kristen", probably started having sex when she was really young too. I mean, lets not kid ourselves here, considering the sexualization of our culture and all . . . and "high-priced call girls"? Well, they certainly weren't born that way.