40% of schoolkids having sex

2004-10-04 22:24

Millicent Merton

Cape Town - Recent statistics that show South African children becoming sexually active at an increasingly younger age is just the tip of the iceberg, said Childline director Joan van Niekerk.

She was responding to the first national Youth Risk Behaviour Survey 2002 (YRBS), which was carried out by the Medical Research Council (MRC).

This study found that more than 40% of schoolchildren are sexually active.

About 14% of children have had sex by the age of 13 or younger.

The study was carried out among 10 699 grade 8 to 11 pupils nationwide.

But Van Niekerk said she was not surprised at the results.

However, she felt the statistics were lower than those found by CietAfrica, which carried out a study on 283 000 children in 2002.

A third of these children were found to have had sex by the age of 10.

According to Van Niekerk, the government is burying its head in the sand over this issue.

Molested

Many of these children who have become sexually active at a young age were molested and merely repeat the action.

According to YRBS, 9,8% of pupils indicated that they were forced to have sex, while 8,3% said they had forced someone to have sex with them.

Van Niekerk feels the increase in child-on-child abuse is going unacknowledged in South Africa.

Unsuitable television programmes, advertisements and the internet contributed to the problem, she said.

According to her, children were often emotionally lost and their sexual behaviour was a way of getting attention.

The MRC's study also found that more than half (54%) of those polled who were sexually active have had more than one partner, 13,8% had been under the influence of alcohol or drugs at the time of having sex, 28,1% mostly did not use any form of contraceptive, 16,4% had been pregnant or had made a girl pregnant, and 7,4% of the pupils who had had sex, had contracted a sexually-transmitted disease.

Dr Ivan Thoms, director of the Western Cape health department, said a national campaign, known as the National Adolescent Friendly Clinic Initiative (Nafci), was already underway to make local clinics more user-friendly for the youth.

Accredited

There are already 15 Nafci clinics in the province and an additional 22 are in the process of being accredited. The Cape Town city council also has a youth strategy to stamp out HIV/Aids.

Thoms feels something needs to be done regarding the approach parents take in educating their children about sex.

According to MRC professor Priscilla Reddy, the council suggests the school curriculum needs to be adjusted so that children are taught about their sexuality.

Parents also need to show more of an interest in their children's sexuality.

- Daily Sun