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| DKT Health Counselor Victor Tapia Orijel (center, white shirt) and a group of high school students who attended his sex talk in the Iztacalco neighborhood of Mexico City. Photo: David J. Olson |
This was originally published on the Huffington Post on August 1, 2017.
MEXICO CITY, Mexico — Health Counselor Victor Tapia Orijel starts
his presentation almost like a stand-up comedian, humorously citing different
situations in the reproductive life of a teenager, from first sexual relations
to different contraceptive methods.
- “If you get horny in school or your best friend’s house, you need to carry condoms.”
- “If you make a booty call, it’s obvious you need condoms."
- “If you drink a lot and then have a one-night stand and don’t remember if you used a condom or not, you should get emergency contraception and condoms.”
His audience was a roomful of 65 high school students in the
Iztacalco delegation of Mexico City. They were entertained and educated at the
same time.
“Most of these young
people learned about sex from their friends,” said Orijel. “It is difficult for
them to talk about sex with their family. The women are the least likely to
talk to their families, due to the burden of machismo that we live with in
Mexico.”
That lack of information is prevalent throughout Latin
America and the Caribbean: Almost three-quarters of pregnancies among
adolescents aged 15-19 in the region are unplanned, according
to the Guttmacher Institute, and about half of those end in abortion. Among
all women 15-19 who need contraceptives, 36% of them are not using a modern
method. In Central America, 46% of sexually active adolescents who want to
avoid pregnancy are not using modern contraceptives.
