Fewer young people are having sex, but the teens and young adults who are sexually active aren’t using condoms as regularly, if at all. And people ages 15 to 24 made up half of new chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis cases in 2022.
The downward trend in condom usage is due to a few things: medical advancements like long-term birth control options and drugs that prevent sexually transmitted infections; a fading fear of contracting HIV; and widely varying degrees of sex education in high schools.
Is this the end of condoms? Not exactly. But it does have some public health experts thinking about how to help younger generations have safe sex, be aware of their options — condoms included — and get tested for STIs regularly.
Unpopular opinion: the complete lack of anyone addressing reduced sensation that comes with condom use when talking to teens is also a contributing factor. I have literally never been able to have an orgasm with a condom on. The first time I had sex, the girl kept asking me if I was gay because I kept losing my erection to the weird glove like sensation on my dick.
I ended up tackling this problem by being careful and being in a string of committed relationships, but I thought there was something wrong with me until stories on the internet made it clear that I wasn’t the only one.
So if I was a modern teen, and knew things could mostly be solved with antibiotics, and had death grip from an adolescence on pornography, AND discovered I couldn’t keep it up when wrapped…then I probably wouldn’t use them either.
Maybe another myth can be cleared out too, the one of “one size fits all”. Curiously it is totally okay to have smaller condoms, but mot bigger…
Too small condoms give exactly the effect you’re describing, IMO.
For me it was the opposite, I needed the dulling to go a reasonable amount of time, but that wasn’t addressed either. There are ultra thin condoms, and lubing up before bagging up can help.
it’s lack of sensation for me since i’m circumcised and the 2 layers when i wear a condom guarantees no sensation.
i suspect that you don’t hear much about this subject because it’s the Achilles heals of condoms where nothing will help it and people don’t engage unless they think they have something that can help.
Who’d have thought banning sex ed in schools would result in unsafe sex amongst teens!?
Back when they used to teach Sex Ed. All of us (boys and girls) had to try to put a condom on a banana. The kicker was we were wearing goggles with vaseline smeared on the lens and had thick rubber gloves on.
This was to simulate trying to put on a condom well under the influence.
Just do it with the mouth 👄 😺
Crazy stuff though to force you to do that, good but crazy.
No one could have predicted it. It was completely out of left field. Unheard of. I’m saying that this is unprecedented. We couldn’t have known! Lé sigh.
Why did we stop listing HIV as a risk of unprotected sex? Everyone mentions chlamydia, which is notoriously common but also very easy to treat and cure, as one of the risks of unprotected sex. I dunno, what about the totally incurable virus that kills you or at least drastically shortens your life span?
For one thing, modern hiv treatments are sufficient to let people live basically normal lives (and more or less stops one from transmitting to sexual partners.)
It’s basically now “just” a chronic condition that requires managing, not a death sentence.
Hep C too. Not incurable, but you really don’t want to get any BBPs.
I would immediately cite anti-LGBTQIA+ sentimentality as the contributing factor. While lots of people understand that homosexuals aren’t the only people who can contract the infection, I’m sure the treatments being aimed primarily at homosexuals as the highest risk group, will make certain people unwilling to believe it is a potential risk.
It sucks that safe sex isn’t a thing being discussed. However it does feel like anti-abortion laws would be unnecessary if teens had access to sought information. I’m sure with the advent of Internet based pornography, teens are being influenced more by that with no educational tools to say that people in pornography (I am sure not everyone across the industry follows health guidelines but for the “professionals” you’d hope they do) have access to testing and other health related care.
If we are going to be cynical about this, one reason I suspect sex education is no longer being thought would be to fall inline with twisted alt-right/conservative values about women NEEDING to have children. With lack of information about contraception, teens might believe they can’t be safe. Maybe they actually have access to contraception but aren’t aware. Maybe contraception is being banned. If you have no contraception, then the rate of pregnancy will increase and maybe those anti-abortion lawmakers wish to see more unwanted pregnancies instead of anyone wishing to engage in recreational sex that doesn’t aim for procreation.
Because HIV isn’t an automatic death sentence anymore, as long as one has access to the drugs available.
It is mentioned. It doesn’t really affect people anymore though if you can get the medication.
I swear between vaccines and this, it’s like we’ve collectively gone backwards.
I do note this is an article based in US but I do wonder if it applies across the world - in the UK, chlamydia and gonorrhoea has gone up (link) with the bullet point at the end:
the impact of STIs remains greatest in young people aged 15 to 24 years; GBMSM; and some minority ethnic groups
For goodness sakes, lads! Put a rubber on it!!
This is really unprovable, but my theory is that this is also another result of late-stage capitalistic exhaustion. While young people still want to be ethical and moral and safe, there’s a lot of moment-to-moment existential rebellion with so many layers of rules, norms and expectations.
It’s similar to the rise of “treat” habits - if there’s no realistic possibility of the American dream and house and white picket fence and kids for an average worker’s salary, you have a moment of probably irresponsible spending that feels life affirming, to shake off the feeling of being in a Matrix pod that’s sucking out your life force in the most efficient manner possible.
Hence, no condom! Or something.
