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Former surgeon general [Elders] calls for change in health care system, sex education
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| Contributor | DFWDem |
| Last Edited | DFWDem Aug 16, 2007 07:38am |
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| Category | General |
| News Date | Thursday, August 16, 2007 01:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | By Jason Wiest
Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK - Fired in 1994 for suggesting school-age children be taught about masturbation, former U.S. Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders said Wednesday a lack of sex education in the nation's public schools has hastened the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and sex crimes against children.
"When we talk about sex education, we all go wild as if that's something we don't talk about. Well, our silence has been deafening and we are paying a very heavy price for not educating our young people," Elders said in a speech to about 200 people at a Community Health Centers of Arkansas summit.
Elders, who as Arkansas health director advocated dispensing condoms at school-based health clinics, was appointed by former President Clinton in 1993 and was fired the next year after saying masturbation "perhaps should be taught" in schools as a way to avoid the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.
Speaking about a national health care crisis Wednesday, Elders said only education, not any amount of money, could improve the U.S. health care system.
"The reason why we have so much AIDS and STD's in Southern states is because we are less likely to have sex education and talk about it as part of our schools and a part of our system," Elders said.
Ignoring contraception and instead teaching only abstinence will not solve the problem, she said.
"We walk around and our government says, 'Oh, Dr. Elders, you know condoms will break.' That's right, they will. But I want to assure you that the vows of abstinence break far more easily than those latex condoms," Elders said. |
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