Warning: Time Machine In Use!

The March 12, 2008 Idaho Statesman also has an article about the high rate of STDs among American girls 14-19, and it includes one rather amazing statement:

Only about half of the girls in the study acknowledged having sex. Some teens define sex as only intercourse, yet other types of intimate behavior including oral sex can spread some diseases.
Among those who admitted having sex, the rate was even more disturbing - 40 percent had an STD.
"This is pretty shocking," said Dr. Elizabeth Alderman, an adolescent medicine specialist at Montefiore Medical Center's Children's Hospital in New York.
"To talk about abstinence is not a bad thing," but teen girls - and boys too - need to be informed about how to protect themselves if they do have sex, Alderman said.
The overall STD rate among the 838 girls in the study was 26 percent, which translates to more than 3 million girls nationwide, researchers with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found. They released the results Tuesday at an STD prevention conference in Chicago.
"Those numbers are certainly alarming," said sex education expert Nora Gelperin, who works with a teen-written Web site called sexetc.org. She said they reflect "the sad state of sex education in our country."
"Sexuality is still a very taboo subject in our society," she said. "Teens tell us that they can't make decisions in the dark and that adults aren't properly preparing them to make responsible decisions."

Huh? They used a time machine to interview someone from the 1950s?
Our society discusses sex endlessly--but seldom discusses the risks associated with it. There is almost no discussion of HPV--some strains of which cause cervical cancer, and are thus a major killer of women. And condoms, while better than nothing, are not sufficient to prevent the spread of HPV.
There is a reluctance to point out that a lot of girls are pressured into premature sex, and many are, if not forcibly raped in a legal sense, are still cajoled and badgered into sex a lot earlier than they are quite ready.
There is very little discussion of how widespread sexual abuse of girls is--and how this premature sexualization plays some part in later promiscuity and acceptance of themselves as sexual objects.
While less common, sexual abuse of boys is a problem, because where girls may turn inward in their destructiveness, boys often turn outward.
Sexuality isn't a taboo subject in our society. It is perilously close to an anti-taboo--where you are pretty much required to discuss it, endlessly. Honest discussion of the risks of premature or casual sexuality--that's the taboo.