Freshmen magazine 1 | Page 11

Why I’m talking about this topic

“Why are you doing this topic?” If I received a dollar, for every time someone asked me this question, then I would have a total of at least $50. I would have enough to buy a Starbucks drink daily for about a month or so, depends on the size I get. I didn’t choose this topic because I am insinuating that I am sexually active or, because I want to be Instead I chose this topic because I want to know more about STIs and how to prevent them from spreading . I know that STIs exist but I never really knew what they are , or how you would get them. But for a fact I knew that my parents, like many the other parents they sometimes try to avoid this topic at all cost. Well that’s what I thought but in reality they might not understand what an STI are or how to prevent them. My didn’t at least. Well more specifically my mom didn’t avoid this question because she always wants me to ask her questions about things I don’t really understand, more specifically about my body and such stuff. I remember the first time I asked her about what an STI was and she responded with “I don’t know what an STI is.” I looked at her and said “what do you mean” then she explained how her mother never talked about STIs I looked at her with disbelieve, I couldn’t believe that she didn’t know what an STI was but she did know what an STD is.

I came to a conclusion that if my mom couldn’t inform me on what an STI are then I would ask my friends. That was a mistake “why?” well because they gave me a lot of incorrect information about this topic. They, told me that an STD and a STI are the same thing but they aren’t they also told me that you can tell if someone has an STI. I later found out that they were wrong, an STD stands for Sexually Transmitted Disease and an STI stands for Sexually Transmitted Infections. “Which is when people become infected, who don’t always experience symptoms or have their infection turn into a disease” (The Difference Between STDs and STIs. (2013, April 2). Retrieved April 3, 2019, from https://beforeplay.org/the-difference-between-stds-and-stis) I know it's an awkward topic but I really want everyone to be informed about this topic no matter their sexuality.

Why it’s a problem

There was this survey conducted on May 05, 2018 that parents took with their teenagers the purpose of conducting this survey was to find out if parents would bring up this topic to their teens.. According to the results “They found out that 516 parents had taken the exam and 582 adolescence have also taken the exam. Out of the 582 adolescence only 45% of those teens aren’t talked to routinely (nearly half of them), then only 13% of those teens were aford STI (screening), and 90% of parents have reported that they do talk to their teens about sex but only 39% of teen have said yes”. (P. A. (2018, May 5). Retrieved April 3, 2019, https://medicalxpress.com/news/2018-05-survey-adolescents-doctors-parents-sex.html)

In this article is shows how Sexual Trensmited Diseases rates in the U.S. in a record high in the fourth year new data from the “Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In that new data it shows 2.3 million cases of chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis were diagnosed in the U.S. in 2017. That’s 200,000 more cases than were diagnosed in 2016, a year that also had a record-high number of cases”, according to the CDC. (DUCHARME, J. (2018, August 28). Americans Are Getting STDs at Record Rates. Americans Are Getting STDs at Record Rates. Retrieved April 3, 2019, from http://time.com/5379165/std-rates-sex/)

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