Importance of Protection

“Why would you use a condom? Condoms are for wusses.” “It feels so much better without a condom.” These common statements made by students our age put young people at risk of pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases. Students engage in sexual intercourse, and few but not enough know or care enough to have safe, protected sex.

Girls are having pregnancy scares and in some cases are getting pregnant in high school. Pregnancy is not only something girls have to go through, but guys have this life changing event as well. They, too, have to tell their parents that they got a girl pregnant, either because they didn’t have access to a condom, didn’t know how to use it, or didn’t care to. The absence of a condom could lead to not only pregnancy.

The chance of pregnancy alone should make someone want to use some form of protection, whether it be a condom, birth control or even plan B, an emergency contraception. Each of these has approximately about a 97% success rate in preventing pregnancy. When all of these are methods used together, the odds of getting pregnant decrease dramatically.

Why a person would take that risk of getting pregnant by having unprotected sex, does not make sense. This choice can lead to an unexpected pregnancy, having to find a good doctor, prepare for labor, and an extensive amount of other things. Above all, getting pregnant means she is going to have to learn to put that child before herself. While some girls are capable of taking the responsibility of taking care of a child while simultaneously being in high school, but a lot of us are nowhere near mature enough.

That says a lot, there are so many consequences to your actions. Just like not studying for a test and then getting a bad grade. It is the same concept, if you are going to have unprotected sex, you going to have to realize and understand what effects it will have on your life.

Not only is unprotected sex leading to pregnancy amongst teens, but also STD’s are present within school. More often than not people are suffering from an STD and are not aware of it. For instance, countless students see abnormalities to their body, or things that just aren’t right, or “aren’t normally here”, and jump to the conclusion that they have an STD, unprotected sex throughout the student body is so common that between their lack of knowledge of true warning signs of STD’s combined with their lack of protection, their immediate thought is they’ve gotten a sexually transmitted disease.

There are simple ways to protect yourself and your significant other. You can obviously use a condom, which prevents pregnancy, the spread of HPV or genital herpes, but you can also get a vaccination for hepatitis B, avoid sharing towels, wash before and after you have sexual intercourse, and talk to your doctor about any concerns you have.

There are many ways to prevent all of these things but not many people will do or take that extra step, and it is mostly because they are too scared to tell anybody. It is understandable, but when it comes to health, it is time to partake and talk to a parent, doctor, or even just a trusted adult.

Believe it or not, you can die from certain STD’s or if you end up pregnant, you could give your baby an STD, and not saying that it happens every time, but it is not impossible for that to happen. They spread quicker than you think, one our of four Americans has had an STD. That’s 25% of our population. Let’s not make it a bigger number.