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Safe sex gets more complicated. What? Sex before marriage has consequences?? Who would have ever guessed.
Sexual infections rise among Gen Y
The Age, July 3, 2008
Lily has always been pretty savvy about safe sex. The 24-year-old nursing student used protection when she had sex with her first boyfriend several years ago, and on the one occasion the condom broke, she had a sexually transmitted infection (STI) check-up. When she began her next relationship, then aged 22, Lily (not her real name) made sure her new boyfriend had also been tested before they stopped using condoms.
So when her doctor told her she had the herpes simplex virus (HSV), or genital herpes, she was stunned.
"I was in a relationship and my partner didn't realise he had it," she says. "He had been tested for STIs but not for HSV. I was completely devastated."
While her story seems unlucky, Lily's situation is not unusual for someone of her generation.
In the past decade, the number of sexual infections in Australia has skyrocketed, with doctors calling it a "mini-epidemic".
Nearly every type of infection has increased in prevalence, with the most common, chlamydia, going up by 300 per cent in the past nine years. Last year alone, there were 51,00 new cases notified to health authorities.
The people most affected by the dramatic rise are Generation Y, those in their late teens and 20s. Doctors estimate that one in ten people in this age group have a a sexual infection.
The alarming rise is largely because young people are having sex earlier, and with more partners than any previous generation. Condom use, while widespread, is inconsistent.
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