STD Chalk Talk is a newsletter for school staff, offering new information on STDs, HIV, sexual health, and local educational and prevention resources relating to adolescents. We welcome your comments and suggestions. The report notes that for most teens, schools are the primary source of STD information. Yet nationally, STD curricula often suffer serious limitations, and may not exist at all at lower grade levels.
Schools often fail to provide teachers with consistent training.
Finally, Dr. Richwald urges districts to consider instituting condom availability programs. Just as they led the fight against polio, says Dr. Richwald, schools can be instrumental in meeting the public health challenge of STDs. It is the most common bacterial sexually transmitted disease in the U.S., the leading cause of tubal infertility in females, and an important cause of infertility in males. It infects up to one in ten sexually active teens. But even after several years of a nationwide epidemic, most people haven't heard of chlamydia.