The Pandemic & Sex Ed
What COVID-19 can teach us about our failing system of public health education
In the movie Mean Girls, there’s an iconic scene in which the gym teacher declares, “if you have sex, you will get pregnant, and you will die”. Most who watch it will remember this scene — it’s been made into memes, gifs, and joked about. But it’s memorable not because of its humor, rather because of its brutally honest representation of American sexual education. Perhaps it’s too real, because in America, there is a crisis of sexual miseducation.
The majority of sexual education curricula is centered on pregnancy prevention and abstinence — it is inherently hetero-normative. For Damian (the gay adolescent in the film), the course offers next to nothing. This is the case for many adolescents across the country. LGBTQ+ inclusive (and therein comprehensive) sexual education is only mandated in ten states. And, even when mandated by policy, there are no accountability measures for the biology, language arts, and gym teachers who have to teach it. The lack of inclusivity and accuracy in this system, for LGBTQ+ individuals, is a sentence to a life of fear, disinformation, and illness.
You’re probably reading this and thinking, Well, what does sexual education have to do with COVID-19? The pandemic we’re living through holds parallels to our crisis of sexual miseducation, while compounding its effects. Both crises convey the importance of prevention through education. Both crises highlight the aggravation and amplification of health inequities. Both crises emphasize the necessity for knowledgeable and inclusive experts in American policymaking. The critical need to revise our approach to public health education is conveyed now more than ever.
Public health education assists with crisis prevention — it is arguably the primary step in averting catastrophe. K-12 schools should focus on preparing their students for personal level crises and how one can personally respond to crises. With sexual education the response to ‘personal level crises’ takes the form of giving adolescents the tools they need to prevent OR respond to sexual assault, an STI diagnosis, or an unhealthy relationship. With pandemic education, the curricula (akin to other emergency education efforts, think fire or lockdown drill) should focus on adequate ‘personal response to crisis’ such as social distancing, symptom identification, and hand-washing. Who knew what social distancing was before COVID-19? Education in public schools is the foundational step to ensure that adolescents grow into well-informed adults; prepared for the personal crises they face and the larger national health crises they will need to individually respond to.
While said education is an important step in ensuring health equity, a lack of education or a miseducation can have the converse effect. It is often stated that ‘LGBTQ+ individuals are at greater risk for HIV, gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis’ but this implies that we are at higher risk because of LGBTQ+ identity. It fails to recognize that this risk is because of a lack of education on STI transmission (specific to these identities). The prevalence of this messaging, and it’s acceptance as fact, showcases that not only the education of the individual matters but the education of those overseeing and ensuring health education also matters. Healthcare providers, executives, and public health officials must be well versed in the intricacies of LGBTQ+ health disparities, in addition to the health-related disparities that other marginalized groups face. If failing to accomplish this, then we end up with decisions being made in a crisis that will affect some groups more than others. One example of this: the use of family dependence on the ethics boards deciding which COVID patients will receive care. If the presence of an extended family — especially children — is used to determine the priority of patients, many LGBTQ+ individuals (who are less likely to have children) would be at a significant disadvantage. The education of both those who are affected by decisions and those making decisions is equally important.
Education focused on identity and inequity is also important in combination with experience (whether that be personal or professional). Those who are knowledgeable should be at the forefront of crafting public health policy. For the vast majority of states, their sexual education curricula are crafted not by sexual educators or by public health organizations, but by politicians. This is what has led to abstinence-only sexual education programs across the country. Individuals which will not face or experience an issue attempt to implement their poorly created solution. It’s a scenario which mirrors that of the federal executive response to COVID-19. This strategy of leaving out experts in public health, both in COVID-19 and sexual education, leaves too much room for blind spots, mismanagement, and individual interest. In both cases, listening to experienced public health officials would lead to better outcomes.
What must also be recognized is that the COVID-19 pandemic response not only parallels but also aggravates the ever-present weaknesses within our sexual education system. Many STI testing centers have been closed. Most students who are no longer in school will not receive a sexual education at home. Those who receive sexual health advice from a medical professional may feel anxious about visiting a hospital. The effects of this pandemic on sexual health will be long-lasting, especially for those already mistreated by healthcare and education systems.
The landscape of sexual education across this country is grim, LGBTQ+ health outcomes even more so. However, if we employ the things we are able to learn from this pandemic in restructuring and reforming our public health education system, we will come out of this stronger than we were before — the scene in Mean Girls becoming a thing of the past.
