Forty Percent of British Pupils Aged 11 Have Not Heard of AIDS

According to a British study, a decade after AIDS information was placed on the school curriculum, large numbers of adolescents just below the age of consent have little knowledge of how to avoid contracting HIV. More than 40,000 children were questioned for the survey last year. Sixteen percent of 15-year old boys believed that HIV could be contracted from a toilet seat. A similar number identified kissing as a risk activity. Forty percent of 11-year-olds had never heard of AIDS -- up 6 percent since 1999. "It's clear that young people's knowledge and motivation to do something about AIDS is declining," said Dr. David Regis of the Schools Health Education Unit, which carried out the survey in 3,600 schools.

"I never knew anyone with HIV," said Clint Walters, who contracted the virus at age 17. "At school all they told us was the biological aspects of sex and pregnancy. I was told to wear a condom or you might get a woman pregnant. I'm sure I got HIV from a guy in London but he didn't look sick." Tim Smith, 22, from Brighton, contracted HIV when he was still attending a Roman Catholic school at 18. "There isn't a day when I don't regret not being taught about AIDS. It was just never discussed at school. The entire focus of our sex education was about getting girls pregnant. They mentioned sexually transmitted diseases but we never got any detail."

Clint Walters has set up an information service called Health Initiatives for Youth -- its youngest contact with HIV is just 15. Terry Joe, who promotes sexual health in Oxfordshire for the Terrence Higgins Trust, said: "It's terrible that so many young people still don't have an adequate grasp of these issues. It's too easy for sexual health to fall off teachers' agendas because they don't know enough or they lack the confidence to discuss it."

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