It is a fact that more and more young people are succumbing to the indignity of STI infection at the moment. When we scratch beneath the surface of these current health issues, we soon discover the fact that education over these infections and diseases is not being communicated as strongly as it should be to this generation.
If you can remember the shocking advertisements that hit our TV screens back in the late-eighties to do with AIDs, you will have probably been scared stiff into practising anything other than safe sex. That sentence - Do not die of ignorance - was enough to make all of our blood curdle and this campaign really did achieve what it set out to.
However, kids born after this HIV and AIDs scare are not able to relate to these advertising campaigns. STI’s may be tackled in school, but will probably be handled very delicately and it is clear that whatever is being taught is not working on this generation. Perhaps the government needs to invest in a new public health warning campaign that will encourage responsibility and for anyone worried about their exposure to risk to undertake an HIV or Chlamydia Test.
The young of today are more ignorant than ever, where this potentially fatal matter is concerned. We also live in a smaller world than ever today, one where the UK Border Agency fails to protect us to any extent when it comes to permitting people to enter our country from countries that are known to have astronomically high levels of HIV and other STI rates.
We all have a duty to protect ourselves where STI’s are concerned. Moreover, we have a duty to protect our sexual partners. The law is only just starting to respect this fact now. It is inevitable that future common law will move in the direction of manslaughter and grievous bodily harm where a person has knowingly or recklessly passed on an infection to other people. Indeed, in some cases, we may even see murder charges being brought against the most irresponsible of individuals.