New study shows booze and drugs fuel sex for Island teens
Published: Sunday, April 10, 2011, 7:48 AM Updated: Sunday, April 10, 2011, 7:51 AM
In another fallout of the borough's rampant youth drug culture, teenagers here are more likely than their counterparts in other boroughs to use alcohol or drugs before being intimate with each other, according to the most recent information from the city Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Engaging in sexual activity in a drink- and drug addled state increases teens' likelihood of making bad choices about partners, being lax about contraception use and not being able to set limits, health professionals say. And in extreme cases, teens may not even remember, afterwards, what exactly they did, or with whom.
"Any sort of alcohol or drug use is going to lower your inhibitions to do things they wouldn't do if they are sober," said Aishah Manuel is the Associate Director, Youth Services for Community Health Action, who talks to teens in outreach events across the borough and in her work overseeing the organization's youth storefront The Place, in St. George. "We talk to kids about how alcohol or drugs are correlative with HIV infection and STDs and pregnancy because if you're drunk or under the influence you are less likely to use a condom or you can't be sure you're using it properly."
She said it is not uncommon to encounter teens who are seeking testing even though they can not remember the details of their sexual encounters.
"There are also stories of young women who were out parting with friends smoking, drinking and they wake up and they don't know what happened," she said. "If they're not clear if they had consent, it brings up the whole other situation, the consent piece."
Of 1,566 borough public high school students who answered an anonymous questionnaire in Fall, 2009, more than 25 percent -- one in four -- said they had used drugs or alcohol before their most recent sexual encounter. In the Bronx, by comparison, not even 16 percent said they had been intoxicated when they last had sex. In Brooklyn and Queens, 18 percent of teens said they had been under the influence, and in Manhattan 20 percent.
The data is part of a sweeping Youth Behavior Risk Survey administered in the fall of 2009 to 11,887 teens at randomly selected high schools citywide.
The bi-annual survey launched in 1997 seeks to gauge New York teens' overall mental health, attitudes about food, exercise, drinking, sex, violence and their sense of having support systems. The next survey will be randomly distributed this fall.
With the exception of their drinking and drug habits, Staten Islanders' responses roughly track those of other city teens on questions about sex, ever since 2003 when the survey was first broken-down by borough: Citywide, teens are growing wiser about contraception use, and more willing to admit they identify as gay or lesbian in recent years.
In Staten Island 2 percent of teens identified as gay in 2009; when that particular question was first put to teens in 2005, only 1 percent said they were gay. The citywide percentages very close to the Island response.
Interestingly, some 4.6 percent of Island youth identified as bisexual, but 8.2 percent said they had sexual partners of both genders in this most recent survey.
The more slow paced side of Staten Island also shines in the data, with Staten Island youngsters less prone to become sexually active before the onset of their teenage years. While 13 percent of teens living here said they had intercourse before the age of 13. In Brookyn, by contrast, 24 percent were sexually active as pre-teens.
While more than 9 percent of teens in the Bronx said they had been pregnant or had gotten someone pregnant, 5 percent of teens here had done the same, the lowest rate in the city. Still, teens here were twice as likely not to know if they had gotten somebody pregnant, (2 percent were "not sure") compared to Queens, where 1 percent answered similarly.
Could it be they were too drunk or high to know?
The trend of Islanders drinking and drugging before sex is not new; and the prevalence of this behavior is on the rise here and citywide.
Ever since the results were broken down by borough, Island teens have been far more likely to be intoxicated during sex than their counterparts in other parts of the city: In 2003, about 23 percent here said drugs and drink were mixed into their last sexual encounter, while only 13 percent of teens in the Bronx said the same. Brooklyn, which ranked second to the Island, had 17 percent admitting to drugs and drink before sex.
Staten Island youth also reported to be the most likely to binge drink and use alcohol in general.
"The take away for us, when we look at this data is this is an issue for teens across the city, although the is prevalence in teens in Staten Island," said Deborah Kaplan, assistant commissioner for the bureau of maternal, infant and reproductive Health for the Department of Health. "We're working to implement intervention which are proven to work, sex ed and learning through role plays around how to make healthy decisions."
She said teens can get free or low cost confidential health services by calling 311 or going to nyc.gov/teenhealth.
Even as many Staten Island teens are grappling with issues around drugs, alcohol and sex, a national survey last month found teens nationwide seem less prone to the hedonistic sexual behavior that might have seemed liberating a generation ago, and instead are steering clear entirely of sexual activity, claiming they are too busy or too aware of the risks involved.
The study by the Center for Disease Control based on interviews of about 5,300 young people, ages 15 to 24, showed the proportion of sexually uninitiated in the group rose in the past decade from 22 percent to about 28 percent.
(source:silive.com)
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