Young people should be encouraged to consider abstaining from sex as one of the options for protecting themselves against the epidemic of sexually transmitted infections sweeping the UK, the Health Protection Agency suggested yesterday.
Figures from the HPA, released in its annual report yesterday, show that teenagers and young people are disproportionately affected by infections such as chlamydia, which can make women infertile, and gonorrhoea.
A television advertising campaign to try to change the sexual behaviour of young people will be launched in the spring, the government said yesterday. The £50m campaign will be as big as that of the 1980s which alerted people to the dangers of Aids with graphic images of tombstones and icebergs.
It comes at a time when there is concern about the ignorance and carelessness of teenagers and young adults towards sex. Chlamydia, gonorrhoea and genital warts are all commonest in women aged 16-19 and men aged 20-24, according to the HPA report.
Abstinence should not be promoted as the only answer, as had happened in places in the US, said Kevin Fenton, who leads on HIV and sexual health for the HPA. But it should be considered alongside other options, such as fewer sexual partners and condom use - in effect the message being promoted throughout Aids-hit countries in the developing world. "It is something we should think about," Dr Fenton said.
Peter Borriello, interim director of the HPA's centre for infections, said that young people were becoming sexually mature at an increasingly early age when they were not emotionally mature. "Couple a lack of maturity to deal with physical maturity and then the alcohol and lifestyle and expectations - it is a heady mixture. It is Ibiza every Saturday night," he said.
The government yesterday pledged to modernise sexual health services, which are under severe stress because of the rise in sexually transmitted diseases. The advertising campaign will be part of a £300m strategy which will aim to reduce waiting times at clinics from several weeks to 48 hours.
"Sexually transmitted infections have been rising steadily over the past few years," said the health secretary, John Reid. "Rates have virtually trebled among men and women over the last 10 years. Prevention messages are not getting through. We need to act now on sexual health - and make it a priority."
Chlamydia is a great concern. The HPA said infections in the last year rose by 8%. Diagnoses of syphillis went up by 28% in the last year, although from a relatively low base, to reach 1,575.
HIV infections have continued to rise as the availability of drugs to keep people alive and healthy appears to have lured some into sexually risky behaviour and people arrive in the UK from countries such as Zimbabwe where HIV is rife. There are now an estimated 53,000 adults living with the virus in the UK, of whom 14,300 do not know it and therefore might unintentionally pass it on.
Most new infections (58%) are no longer in the gay and bisexual populations, but among heterosexuals, who were usually infected abroad. We are now seeing, said Dr Fenton, "the disproportionate impact of the sub-Saharan HIV epidemic on the UK epidemic due to population movement."
