KFF designs, conducts and analyzes original public opinion and survey research on Americans’ attitudes, knowledge, and experiences with the health care system to help amplify the public’s voice in major national debates.
The Entertainment Media as “Sex Educators?” And, Other Ways Teens Learn About Sex, Contraception, STDs, and AIDS
A fact sheet, Q&A and resource list prepared for a briefing held in New York on June 24, 1996, co-sponsored by Kaiser Family Foundation, the National Press Foundation and The Alan Guttmacher Institute, as part of an ongoing briefing series for journalist on reproductive health issues: Emerging Issues in Reproductive Health. This briefing focused on understanding the different ways teens get information about sex, contraception, STDs and AIDS — looking particularly at the role of the entertainment media as “sex educators.”
Q&A: The Entertainment Media as “”Sex Educators?”” And, Other Ways Teens Learn About Sex, Contraception,
Resource List: The Entertainment Media as “”Sex Educators?”” And, Other Ways Teens Learn About Sex, Contraception,
How the Changing Health Care Marketplace Affects Coverage and Access to Reproductive Health
A fact sheet, Q&A and resource list prepared for a media briefing held in New York on March 27, 1996. The purpose of the briefing was to respond to questions about how reproductive health services are currently delivered in managed care systems and to explore the implications of the growing managed care environment for women’s ability to get the reproductive health care they need. A copy of the original agenda is also included in this packet of materials. For additional background materials, please see #1081, Reproductive Health and Managed Care.
Q&A: The Growth of Managed Care: Are Women Getting What They Need?
Fact Sheet: Reproductive Health Coverage in Managed Care Settings
Resource List: The Growth of Managed Care: Are Women Getting What They Need?
Edward Laumann, Ph.D., Department of Sociology, University of Chicago, shares findings from the 1994 National Health and Social Life Survey, which suggest that having a violent or coercive first sexual experience is not as rare an occurrence as had been previously believed. Seminar participants — experts on sexuality and sexual relationships — debate the prevalence and consequences of abusive and negative first sexual experiences. This publication was produced as part of an ongoing seminar series, jointly sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI), on “Sexuality and American Social Policy.” The series is co-sponsored by The Alan Guttmacher Institute, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and The Population Council.
Monographs as part of the ongoing seminar series, jointly sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI), “.”
Who’s At Risk?HIV is a disease of behaviors. For the most part, it is what you do that puts you at risk of AIDS.The basic routes of transmission–unprotected sex, sharing contaminated drug injectionequipment, from infected mothers to their newborn babies, or receiving contaminated blood orblood products–have been known for well over a decade. More than 80 percent of all cases ofAIDS have been among men who have sex with men and injection drug users. Despite a clearunderstanding of how the virus is transmitted,
In 1993, AIDS became the leading cause of death for adults aged 25-44 in the U.S. HIV isincreasingly a disease of the young–one in four new infections occurs in people under age 22.
People of color bear a disproportionate share of the burden of AIDS. African Americans andLatinos together comprise approximately 23% of the U.S. population, yet they account for nearly50% of the AIDS cases.
Comparison of US AIDS Patients (244,372) (as of 12/31/92) and Estimated 1991 U.S. Population by Race/Ethnicity
A White, Non-Hispanic D Asian/Pacific IslanderB Black, Non-Hispanic E American Indian/Alaskan Native C HispanicSource: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Gay and bisexual men represent a decreasing percentage of newly diagnosed cases of AIDS, bothbecause their rate of increase has slowed in recent years (1989 through 1994) and because theepidemic is growing more rapidly in other segments of the population. Nevertheless, gay andbisexual men continue to constitute the largest portion of people with newly diagnosed AIDS, sosuccess in controlling the AIDS epidemic depends on preventing new cases among this group.
Approximately one-third of all AIDS cases are linked to injection drug use. For women, 64% ofall AIDS cases are due to injection drug use or sex with partners who inject drugs. Injecting druguse is the source of infection for more than half of all children born with HIV.
AIDS is also a growing problem for women. Women are one of the fastest growing populationsbeing infected with HIV. The number of AIDS cases among women is doubling every one to twoyears. Because of the far greater number of cases among men in the early years of the epidemic,risks to women were often overlooked.
Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Can People Change Their Behaviors?Adopting healthy habits is not always an easy task. Knowledge and awareness of health risks areessential. Surveys show a remarkable degree of awareness regarding the basic facts of HIVtransmission among American adults and teenagers. This is a starting point for behavior change,but, as with other health risks, knowledge alone is unlikely to be sufficient to achieve and sustainthe behavioral changes necessary to avoid HIV transmission.
In the face of the threat of HIV, many have changed their behaviors. Gay and bisexual men madedramatic changes in the rate of unprotected sex and multiple sexual partners in the early years ofthe epidemic. In San Francisco, new infections reached a high of 8,000 in 1982. In 1994, theestimated number of new HIV infections was 1,000. This dramatic reduction in new infections canbe attributed in part to comprehensive community-based HIV prevention efforts aimed at gay andbisexual men that began in the early 1980s.
Injection drug users, despite much conventional wisdom to the contrary, have also changedbehavior, reducing the sharing of injection equipment. The rate of HIV infection among druginjectors varies considerably from city to city ranging anywhere from a few percent to 60 percentor more. This variability underscores the opportunities which remain to decrease the transmissionof HIV among drug injectors, and thereby avoiding further spread to sexual partners andoffspring.
Are HIV Prevention Programs Worthwhile?With prospects for a preventive vaccine still quite remote, HIV prevention and education effortsremain critical to efforts to reduce the numbers of new HIV infections. The case forprevention
The is a national random-sample telephone survey of 1,211 adults, 18 years and older, including over samples of 250 African Americans and 250 Hispanics.
How the Changing Health Care Marketplace Affects Coverage and Access to Reproductive Health
A fact sheet, Q&A and resource list prepared for a media briefing held in New York on March 27, 1996. The purpose of the briefing was to respond to questions about how reproductive health services are currently delivered in managed care systems and to explore the implications of the growing managed care environment for women’s ability to get the reproductive health care they need. A copy of the original agenda is also included in this packet of materials.
Q&A: The Growth of Managed Care: Are Women Getting What They Need?
Fact Sheet: Reproductive Health Coverage in Managed Care Settings
Resource List: The Growth of Managed Care: Are Women Getting What They Need?
The is a national effort to provide the latest information in AIDS policy, prevention and treatment announced at a briefing in Washington, D.C. in March 26, 1996.
