Patrick seeks to forgo grant, end classes on sex abstinence

[Mass]

Do we need to clean the MA house as well?

Why do they insist in continuing grants for a program that has proven to be useless and even dangerous?

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/04/24/patrick_seeks_to_forgo_grant_end_classes_on_sex_abstinence/

Patrick seeks to forgo grant, end classes on sex abstinence
But leaders in House back funding

By Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff | April 24, 2007

Governor Deval Patrick wants to end state-sponsored , abstinence-only sex education in Massachusetts, a year after Governor Mitt Romney ordered the Department of Public Health to redirect a long-standing federal abstinence grant to classes that focus exclusively on encouraging teenagers to avoid sexual encounters.

Patrick proposed forgoing the $700,000 grant, which the state has received since 1998, joining at least six other states in rebelling against increasingly restrictive federal mandates about how the money can be used.

The Patrick administration points to the federal government's study of abstinence-education programs, released this month, which found that students in programs focusing solely on abstinence are just as likely to have sex as those not in such programs. At the same time, health officials say, the programs' emphasis on the failure rate of condoms and other birth control, without providing instruction about their benefits, may confuse young people and discourage them from using protection.

"We don't believe that the science of public health is pointing in the direction of very specific and narrowly defined behavioral approaches like the one that is mandated by this funding," said John Auerbach, the state commissioner of public health.

Patrick's policy change, proposed in his budget, has met resistance in the House, where Democratic leaders restored the funding in the budget plan that came to the floor yesterday at the start of a week-long debate.
...
In late 2005, Romney -- then a potential presidential candidate who was trying to establish credentials as a social conservative -- announced that he would channel the money directly into expanding abstinence education programs in schools. During the remainder of his administration, Massachusetts funneled more than $800,000 to Healthy Futures, a group that had been running abstinence education programs in more than three dozen middle schools.Continued...

The state's new focus on abstinence-only education coincided with increasingly strict rules from the federal government, which dictated that programs receiving the money must deliver a detailed, eight-point message. That includes teaching that sexual activity outside marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects and that it is important to be financially self-sufficient before engaging in sexual activity.

...
The Patrick administration and other opponents of abstinence-only education argue that abstinence education should be part of a comprehensive sex education class and that the strict limitations on the federal funding mean the Healthy Futures classes are not integrated with a regular sex education program.

"These programs are prohibited by federal regulation from discussing the prevention benefits of birth control, other than to emphasize the failure rate," said Angus McQuilken, vice president for public relations and governmental affairs for the Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts. "That is a dangerously unrealistic and irresponsible approach."
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[polmaven]

1. We do have an awful lot of

House members who should have (R) behind their names instead of (D). Many of them are re-elcted year after year because there are also an awful lot of voters who don't pay attention.