DR GABRIELLE JAMELA HOSEIN
FOR MORE than 20 years, I have been learning about sexual and reproductive health and rights information and services, and their value.
They can help women and men to choose when and by how much they grow their families. They can protect children from child sexual abuse, unwanted and early sex, relationship violence and unplanned pregnancies.
They are critical for reaching those who experience discrimination because of their class, ethnicity, disability, gender identity or sexual orientation, and cannot access healthcare that respects their rights and dignity.
What I've learned is that facts and data are key.
There are decades of research that show the benefits of family planning. Across the region, there is also overwhelming data that health and family life education (HFLE) programmes and comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) (and the two are not the same), enable adolescents to understand their bodies and reproduction, delay sex and pregnancy, identify and disclose sexual abuse and sexual violence, and better negotiate contraception and sexual safety when they are ready to consent to love, sex and intimacy.
These are also the only programmes that provide trusted adults who can provide answers to adolescents' questions about their bodies, desires and fears, and correct myths they may hold about sex, power and relationships, when the majority cannot openly speak with their parents or may be in abusive families and turn instead to their peers and the internet.
Speak to teachers about HFLE and hear their stories about how much such a national curriculum is needed, and the trauma, violence and unhealthy sexual experiences they are encountering among students every day.
Thousands of children report child abuse every year and thousands more are in violent homes. The innocence of childhood is a myth for those most vulnerable. Today, we understand the value of teaching about 'good touch' and 'bad touch' in age-appropriate ways and from preschool. Similarly, it would be irresponsible of the State to not have such educational programmes in place for children and their peers.
In every country in the Caribbean where they are actually asked, adolescents want these programmes and speak about how they would help them to better understand themselves, their peers, adults and their families, media messages, and the world around them. These are quite simply the facts.
In contrast, as I've written about before, those who oppose comprehensive sexuality education appear continuously willing to misinform the public.
The latest videos circulating feature Umar Abdullah boycotting the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF)'s office. He and his supporter describe IPPF, whose mandate is to 'ensure people are free to make choices about their sexuality and wellbeing, in a world without discrimination,' as trying to take the souls of children, promoting eugenics (think of the Nazis), legalising paedophilia, promoting socialism, turning children into sex objects, bowi
