Sexual education: morality or teen safety?

Abstract

Millions of teenagers internationally become pregnant every year. Most of these pregnancies are unintended, and many of the resulting children are not properly cared for. There are one million unintended teen pregnancies in the United States alone. Sexual education has significantly reduced the number of teen pregnancies in many Western nations. These successful school programs instruct teens about the methods of pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease prevention. The United States needs to reevaluate its own sexual education program and determine why so many nations have succeeded in this realm. The qualitative analysis of these programs is used to determine how these programs differ from the current programs in use in the United States, and how the United States could implement the same strategies that have been proven effective.