How Queens teens rate in sex survey

The morning after what?
A recent survey conducted by city health officials found that only 41 percent of Queens kids had heard of emergency contraception (EC) - or the “morning after” pill - the lowest percent of all five boroughs.
On average 47 percent of teens citywide had knowledge of EC, with Manhattan boasting the highest figure - 55 percent.
In response to the survey, which included a number of questions about sexual activity, health officials called for students to get better education about sexual protection, for parents to talk to their kids, and for more teens to be encouraged to wait.
In a report released on Wednesday, August 29, Thomas R. Frieden, the Commissioner of the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH), made recommendations to parents, schools and healthcare providers.
Parents should talk to their children about sex and advise them to postpone the act, but still teach about the importance of birth control should a teen decide to become sexually active, the report recommended.
“Postponing sex has many benefits for teens,” said Frieden said. “Teenagers who choose to have sex should know that condoms and long-acting contraceptives are both important.”
Schools and youth programs should provide age-appropriate sex education, push kids to talk to their parents and create extracurricular activities.
In addition, doctors and healthcare providers should encourage abstinence, educate about birth control, advocate the use of condoms to prevent sexually transmitted infections (STI), and advise teens to limit their number of sexual partners, the report recommends.
The report, based on self-administered, anonymous questionnaires handed out in 2005, found that nearly half of city high school students have had sex - 41 percent of 9th-graders and 58 percent of 12th-graders. This number is about the same as the nationwide figure and has stayed about the same since 1997, the report notes. However, only one-third of city teens - 30 percent - are sexually active, a figure lower than the national average of 34 percent.
More city kids - 69 percent - use condoms than the nationwide number - 63 percent. The report also looked at the relationship between the use of birth control and ethnicity. Overall one in five teenage girls said that they did not use birth control the last time they had sex, compared with 14 percent nationwide.