reproductive health services for adolescents - Pathfinder International

Module 16/Trainer's Tools
Trainer's Tool 6.1: Sexual Safety Questionnaire Answer Key
Instructions: Indicate whether you think the statement is true or false and explain
your reasoning.
1. Young people are more vulnerable to STIs than older adults.
Answer: TRUE. Young people have less access to relevant information, even when
they are sexually active. They may be more reluctant to seek treatment, and
services are more likely to be unavailable or inaccessible to them. Young adults
often lack social or economic power, which may force them to resort to selling sex,
which in turn leaves them at risk of infection, exploitation, and abuse.
2. People increase their risk of HIV infection 10 times if they do NOT use a
condom when having intercourse with a person who's HIV status they do not
know.
Answer: TRUE. Assuming that condoms are 90% effective, medical researchers
calculate that people reduce their chance of becoming infected with HIV 10 times
with the use of condoms. However, condoms can be more or less effective than this
rate.
3. In heterosexual intercourse with an HIV partner, young women are at greater
physiological risk of becoming infected than young men.
Answer: TRUE. The female reproductive tract remains immature until at least 18
years of age. The walls of the vagina, cervix, and uterus are thin and easily ruptured,
penetrated, and infected. Cervical mucus output is frequently inadequate in very
young women, and lack of lubrication can increase the likelihood of infection.
Studies show that the concentration of HIV is higher in semen than in vaginal
secretions, and that abrasions or cuts occur more often in the vagina than on the
penis. Semen remains in the vagina for a long time, increasing the risk of infection.
4. A major reason condoms break is because they have been used incorrectly
with an oil-based lubricant.
Answer: TRUE. Commonly used oil-based lubricants, such as vaseline, break down
the latex of condoms and make breakage more likely. Only water-based lubricants
or contraceptive cream should be used with condoms.
5. People without any symptoms of illness may carry and transmit HIV to a sex
partner.
Answer: TRUE. The average incubation time for HIV, from infection to diagnosis of
full-blown AIDS, is now 8 years. During much of this time a person may have no
symptoms. Yet, very soon after infection a person can infect others. In the weeks
and even months following infection, a test for HIV may remain negative because
the test measures the presence of antibodies that may not have been formed yet.
6. People who have had one sexually transmitted disease are at higher risk of
contracting a second STI, including AIDS.
Answer: TRUE. There is increasing evidence that people who have had one STI are
at higher than average risk for getting a second infection. This may be related to
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Adolescent Curriculum