"Now the Democrats Are Funding Abstinence?" [View All]

[leftchick]

omg..... :argh:


http://www.alternet.org/story/53700


Back in November of 2006, after the Democrats won control of the House, what kind of odds do you think you would have gotten on the following scenario: With the Democrats in control, the appropriations cycle begins and the first big policy step the Democrats take on domestic reproductive health is to push through a 30 percent increase in abstinence-only-until-marriage programs that prohibit information about condoms and birth control. Oh, and by the way, that increase (to $140 million) is larger than any put forward in the last three years of the Republican-led Congress.

"Huh?" you might ask.

Now, let me make the scenario even better -- or worse. What if you were told that just six weeks before the Appropriations Committee met, a major 10-year evaluation that Congress itself had mandated was released showing that abstinence-only programs had no impact on teen behavior? On top of that, what if you were told that the Society of Adolescent Medicine had released a report in 2006 stating that abstinence-only-programs "threaten fundamental human rights to health, information and life?"

And wait, there's more. When Democrat Henry Waxman was the ranking minority member on government oversight back in 2004, his staff did a report on the content of abstinence-only programs that showed over 80 percent of the programs contained "false or misleading information." All the way back in 2000, the Institute of Medicine, the nation's leading authority on public health, had called for the termination of abstinence-only programs because they represent "poor fiscal and public health policy."

Crying uncle yet? Don't, because there's still more.