II 

114TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. 923 

To authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through 

the Administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration, 

to award grants on a competitive basis to public and private entities 

to provide qualified sexual risk avoidance education to youth and their 

parents. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

APRIL 14, 2015 

Mr. GRAHAM (for himself, Mr. VITTER, Mr. THUNE, Mr. SCOTT, Mr. SESSIONS, and Mr. COATS) introduced the following bill; which was read 

twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and 

Pensions 

A BILL 

To authorize the Secretary of Health and Human Services, 

acting through the Administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration, to award grants 

on a competitive basis to public and private entities 

to provide qualified sexual risk avoidance education to 

youth and their parents. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Healthy Relationships 

5 Act of 2015’’. 


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1 SEC. 2. SEXUAL RISK AVOIDANCE EDUCATION. 

2 Part P of title III of the Public Health Service Act 

3 (42 U.S.C. 280g et seq.) is amended by adding at the end 

4 the following: 

5 ‘‘SEC. 399V–6. SEXUAL RISK AVOIDANCE EDUCATION. 

6 ‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary, acting through 

7 the Administrator of the Health Resources and Services 

8 Administration, may award grants on a competitive basis 

9 to public and private entities to provide qualified sexual 

10 risk avoidance education to youth and their parents. 

11 ‘‘(b) QUALIFIED SEXUAL RISK AVOIDANCE EDU12 CATION.—To be eligible to receive a grant under sub13 section (a), an entity shall submit an application to the 

14 Secretary describing a sexual risk avoidance education 

15 program that the entity would offer and that meets all 

16 of the following requirements: 

17 ‘‘(1) The primary emphasis and context for 

18 each topic covered through the program shall be the 

19 unambiguous message that postponing sexual activ20 ity is the optimal sexual health behavior for youth. 

21 ‘‘(2) The education shall be medically accurate. 

22 ‘‘(3) The education shall use an evidence-based 

23 approach. 

24 ‘‘(4) The education shall be age appropriate. 

25 ‘‘(5) The education shall include thorough 

26 treatment of each of the following topics: 


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1 ‘‘(A) The holistic individual and societal 

2 benefits associated with personal responsibility, 

3 success sequencing, self-regulation, goal-setting, 

4 healthy decisionmaking, and a focus on the fu5 ture. 

6 ‘‘(B) The research-based advantage of re7 serving sexual activity for marriage, as associ8 ated with poverty prevention and optimal phys9 ical and emotional health for all youth, regard10 less of previous sexual experience. 

11 ‘‘(C) The skills needed to resist the perva12 sive sex-saturated culture that portrays teenage 

13 sexual activity as an expected norm, with few 

14 risks or negative consequences. 

15 ‘‘(D) The foundational components of 

16 healthy relationships and their impact on the 

17 formation of healthy marriages and safe and 

18 stable families. 

19 ‘‘(E) How to avoid sexual coercion, dating 

20 violence, and risk behaviors, such as drugs, al21 cohol, and the misuse of social media. 

22 ‘‘(6) The education shall ensure that any infor23 mation provided on contraception emphasizes the su24 perior health benefits of sexual delay and does not 

25 exaggerate the effectiveness of contraception in preVerDate Sep 11 2014 01:12 Apr 17, 2015 Jkt 049200 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S923.IS S923

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1 venting the physical and non-physical consequences 

2 of teen sexual activity. 

3 ‘‘(c) PRIORITY.—In awarding grants under sub4 section (a), the Secretary shall give priority to applicants 

5 proposing programs to provide qualified sexual risk avoid6 ance education that— 

7 ‘‘(1) serves youth throughout the middle and 

8 high school grades; and 

9 ‘‘(2) will promote parent-child communication 

10 regarding healthy sexual decisionmaking. 

11 ‘‘(d) DEFINITIONS.—In this Act: 

12 ‘‘(1) The term ‘age appropriate’ means appro13 priate for the general developmental and social ma14 turity of the age group, as opposed to appropriate 

15 to the cognitive ability to understand a topic or the 

16 atypical development of a small segment of the tar17 geted population. 

18 ‘‘(2) The term ‘evidence-based approach’ means 

19 an approach that— 

20 ‘‘(A) has a clear theoretical framework in21 tegrating research findings with practical imple22 mentation relevant to the field; 

23 ‘‘(B) matches the needs and desired out24 comes for the intended audience; and 


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1 ‘‘(C) if effectively implemented, will dem2 onstrate improved outcomes for the targeted 

3 population. 

4 ‘‘(3) The term ‘medically accurate’ means ref5 erenced to peer-reviewed research by medical, edu6 cational, scientific, governmental, or public health 

7 publications, organizations, or agencies. 

8 ‘‘(4) The term ‘sexual risk avoidance’ means 

9 voluntarily refraining from sexual activity. 

10 ‘‘(5) The term ‘sexual activity’ means genital 

11 contact or sexual stimulation for the purpose of 

12 arousal, including sexual intercourse. 

13 ‘‘(6) The term ‘success sequencing’ means the 

14 progression of youth through a series of behavioral 

15 benchmarks that increases the youth’s chances of 

16 avoiding poverty, in the following sequence: com17 pleting school, securing a job, and marrying before 

18 bearing children. 

19 ‘‘(e) AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.— 

20 ‘‘(1) IN GENERAL.—There is authorized to be 

21 appropriated $110,000,000 for each of fiscal years 

22 2016 through 2020 to carry out this section. 

23 Amounts authorized to be appropriated by the pre24 ceding sentence shall be derived exclusively from 

25 amounts in the Prevention and Public Health Fund 


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1 established by section 4002 of the Patient Protection 

2 and Affordable Care Act (42 U.S.C. 300u–11). 

3 ‘‘(2) FEDERAL ADMINISTRATIVE COSTS.—Of 

4 the amounts appropriated under paragraph (1) for 

5 a fiscal year— 

6 ‘‘(A) not more than $1,000,000 may be 

7 used for Federal administrative costs; and 

8 ‘‘(B) of the amount used by the Secretary 

9 for administrative costs, at least 40 percent 

10 shall be used for training and technical assist11 ance by qualified organizations— 

12 ‘‘(i) whose sole focus is the develop13 ment and advancement of sexual risk 

14 avoidance; 

15 ‘‘(ii) have expertise in theory-based 

16 sexual risk avoidance curriculum develop17 ment and implementation; 

18 ‘‘(iii) have direct experience in devel19 oping sexual risk avoidance evaluation in20 struments; and 

21 ‘‘(iv) can offer technical assistance 

22 and training on a wide range of topics rel23 evant to the sexual risk avoidance field.’’. 

Æ 


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