http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/03/30/uganda10380.htm Uganda: 'Abstinence-Only' Programs Hijack AIDS Success Story
U.S.-Sponsored HIV Strategy Threatens Youth(London, March 30, 2005)—U.S.-funded “abstinence-only” programs are jeopardizing Uganda’s successful fight against HIV/AIDS, Human Rights Watch said in a new report today. Abstinence-only programs deny young people information about any method of HIV prevention other than sexual abstinence until marriage.
The 80-page report, “The Less They Know, the Better: Abstinence-Only HIV/AIDS Programs in Uganda,” documents the recent removal of critical HIV/AIDS information from primary school curricula, including information about condoms, safer sex and the risks of HIV in marriage. Draft secondary-school materials state falsely that latex condoms have microscopic pores that can be permeated by HIV, and that pre-marital sex is a form of “deviance.” HIV/AIDS rallies sponsored by the U.S. government spread similar falsehoods.
“These abstinence-only programs leave Uganda’s children at risk of HIV,” said Jonathan Cohen, a researcher with Human Rights Watch's HIV/AIDS Program and one of the report’s authors. “Abstinence messages should complement other HIV-prevention strategies, not undermine them.”
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