As long as sexual intimacy remains a pleasurable outlet for humans, the risk of HIV transmission is a real possibility for all sexually active people. Adults are vulnerable to this danger as a result of intimate behaviors with more than one sexual partner, due in large part to a heightened sense of sexual awareness and promiscuity that is promoted in contemporary society and the media. Adolescents also are at increasing risk for HIV because of their natural feelings of invincibility and the added thrill of risk-taking. Teenagers' vulnerability increases with the frequency of unsafe sex practices and the additional numbers of sexual partners within their tightly-knit teenage school population. Reputable studies show that the majority of high school seniors and college freshmen in the U.S. have sex on a regular basis with multiple sexual partner, the average being four partners by this age. Every year, the median age of HIV-infected people has been continually dropping. A person who tests positive for HIV in their twenties may have contracted the virus in their teens while in high school. As the teenage pool becomes more contaminated with HIV, the likelihood of contracting the deadly virus from new partners increases exponentially. By the turn of the century, Dr. Chittick suggests, it will be difficult for most sexually active teens (both gay and straight; of different racial backgrounds; whether living in urban, suburban, or rural areas) to avoid coming in contact with at least one HIV-positive partner. Thus, the coming new wave of AIDS among adolescents. There are positive choices teens can make regarding HIV/AIDS.
Postpone your first sexual experience
Avoid the sharing of bodily fluids
Understand the danger from substance abuse
Avoid promiscuous behavior
Practice safer sex techniques
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Postpone your first sexual experience
^ Top | | Choose abstinence until older and more mature (physically and emotionally). Not having intimate sexual relations with a partner is the only 100% effective way of avoiding HIV by sexual transmission. This is not a morality-based argument but a scientically-accurate fact. Younger teens, with immune systems that have not yet fully developed, are at greater risk if sexually intimate. |
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Avoid the sharing of bodily fluids
^ Top | | With another person, outside of a permanent, monogamous relationship. The exchange of intimate bodily fluids can carry the HIV virus and other sexually transmitted infections. While kissing is not considered to be a risky activity by most every expert, unsafe sexual practices where foreign fluids are absorbed into your body, should be stopped by the regular use of prophylactic barriers such as condoms. |
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Understand the danger from substance abuse
^ Top | | Alcohol, drugs, etc. can impair your judgment and increase high risk behaviors. Many people living with HIV/AIDS suggest that their seropositive status directly resulted from unsafe sex or the sharing of contaminated needles while high and under the influence of narcotics or alcohol. Exercise caution. |
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Avoid promiscuous behavior
^ Top | | Frequent and unsafe sexual activity with more than one partner. Even "serial monogamy" (repeatedly going from one intimate relationship to another), which is common among youth during high school and college, is very risky. Remember, each time you have sex with a new person, you are in effect sleeping with all of their previous partners, ad infinitum. These are the medical facts. |
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Practice safer sex techniques
^ Top | | Whenever having intimate sexual relations with a partner. While no "safer sex" technique is 100% safe, some practices will help to minimize your risk of HIV transmission: a) Use condoms properly (there is a right and wrong way).
b) Do not share needles for drugs, tattooing or body piercing.
c) Avoid the ingestion of another person's bodily fluids.
d) Substitute sexual "outercourse" for "intercourse" whenever possible.
e) Masturbation is a safe and normal alternative for sexual release.
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