WE RECOMMEND EPIDEMIC: HOW TEEN SEX IS KILLING OUR KIDS BY DR. MEG MEEKER, MD Parents! You Need To Read This...

Meg Meeker, MD

Meeker's book, "Epidemic: How Teen Sex Is Killing Our Kids," pushed a lot of people's hot buttons, she says, because they don't view the sexual epidemic as a health problem, but as an economic and political problem.

Dr. Meeker, who for the past twenty years has taken care of young people from the ages of twelve to twenty one, says she wrote her book as a mea culpa---she has dramatically changed the way she practices medicine.

During her residency training at Children's Hospital in Wisconsin, she says she learned to help teenagers avoid becoming pregnant. At Mount Holyoke College during the seventies, she learned to help young women improve themselves emotionally, physically and professionally. It is something she says she loved to do.

"What I felt that I could do for young girls was to help keep them in school, and that meant do one thing very well, keep them from getting pregnant; And so I did."

Dr. Meeker worked with inner-city kids in Springfield Mass. "From a physician's standpoint, keeping kids from getting pregnant is pretty easy," she says. "Many kids don't take oral contraceptives very consistently, so we just whip out Depo-Privera, give them a shot every three months, make sure they come in and they avoid pregnancy very well. I did that pretty successfully for a number of years," she says.

Meeker then moved to "cushy" Northern Michigan to practice with her husband, thinking at the time it would be a great to get away from Chlamydia, Pelvic Inflammatory Disease and Herpes.

"The inner city kids are so troubled and in gangs," she thought. "I think I'm ready to deal with some healthy breast feeding problems for a change."

Meeker started taking care of a lot of her friends' kids and her kids' friends. She took care of a lot of middle class, upper middle class kids including a lot of doctors' and psychiatrists' kids.

A very disturbing thing happened, she says.

"My friends' daughters and sons were coming into my office with abnormal Pap Smears, HPV infections, Herpes, Chlamydia, Gonorrhea, Syphilis."

Dr Meeker became very alarmed. Then she saw something she wasn't well trained for at all-escalating rates of depression in teenagers. These were the nice kids; the soccer and hockey kids

"Noone told us how to take care of depression," she says.

Meeker says when she finished her training, only psychiatrists took care of kids with ADD by dispensing Ritalin and Dexadrine, which is all they had back then.
In the last twenty years, things have changed very quickly, she says.

Dr. Meeker thought that maybe it was just her. Maybe she had a propensity to attract all the kids with all the problems.

Then she went to the medical literature and to the Center for Disease Control. She went to the National Institute for Health and she started making phone calls.

"What I found in the medical literature absolutely made me crazy," she says. "It made me furious as a mother of three teenage daughters and an eleven year-old son"

Meeker found references to a "hidden epidemic" of sexually transmitted diseases among youths. She was angry that it was hidden and referred to that way.

The epidemic wasn't just in her own beautiful corner of America, but all across the country, she says. "The kids didn't know it and the parents didn't know it," she says.

Expectations

Looking to causes ands solutions; Dr. Meeker spoke at length about how our kids are saturated with sexual messages in advertising, at the mall, in music and other media. "Our media culture is seducing our kids," she says.

"For the first time in American history we are rearing a generation of teenagers whose behavior is following adult expectations, which tells them you will be sexually active."

Adult expectations drive teenage behavior and always have, says Meeker, adding that the average teen today believes they do not have a choice about sexual activity.

"We grew up believing we had a choice about sexual activity because our parents expected that we would not be sexually active," she says.

Yet we as adults communicate to our teenagers that they will be sexually active, she says.

Meeker says she does many radio shows, and without fail, a parent calls in and takes her to task for not giving condoms to her young patients.

"Dr. Meeker, you know they are going to be sexually active so you have to keep them safe," say the callers.

Meeker asks, "Do you understand how powerful that thinking is? That is the mindset of physicians, of teachers, and most of you. It was my mindset too."

When the sexual revolution took off and we decided to change all the rules, some very smart business people decided there was a lot of money to be made. Sex became a marketing tool aimed primarily at our kids and at younger and younger ages, she says.

Meeker singles out the Abercrombie and Fitch clothing stores in the malls as one of the worst examples. She says they target the 12 to 15 crowd with sexual images as they walk into the store.

Herbal Essence shampoo commercials show a woman experiencing an orgasm from simply washing her hair, says Meeker.

In the grocery store, kids accompanying their mothers in the checkout line are inundated with sexual images on the magazine rack next to the candy.

Meeker says our kids' tender young minds are saturated with visual and auditory sexual messages all day, every day wherever they go.

"They are being inducted into a world of sexual activity from about the age of eight on," she says.

The message to young people is you are not worth a whole lot, you are not one of the beautiful people if you aren't having sex.

Meeker says she, like a lot of parents, felt overwhelmed and asked, "what can I do?" She says if you walk into any obstretician/gynecologist office and ask if they understand there is an epidemic out there, they will answer "of course, there has been one for years, but there is nothing I can do about it."

"We feel so powerless over this multi-billion dollar industry," says Meeker.

She decided to write her book, put the data before the public and say "do with it what you will," but she wouldn't have written it if she didn't think there was an answer.

Physicians and health officials have known for the last ten years at least that we have a problem on our hands, she says. The medical community said they would tackle teen pregnancy rates and has had some success. Although the rates are still too high, they have fallen some, says Meeker.

Because of AIDS and the vocal homosexual community, there has been a lot of condom education, says Meeker. Kids were inundated with the message that all would be well if they just put on a condom.

"The National Institute for Health realizes we have an epidemic on our hands, so in June of 2001, they convened a panel of experts around the country to figure out one thing-do condoms work?"

Meeker says she is asked all the time if condoms work and she answers that it depends on how old the kid is, what kind of disease you are talking about, how long they have been in a relationship, etc.

"It is a very complicated issue," she says.

Meeker interviewed several of the NIH panel of experts for her book. She says they looked at all the best condom literature in the medical community and threw most of it away because the studies weren't any good.

"And then they found something that was absolutely chilling," she says. "Now remember they did this understanding we have been teaching condoms to our kids for almost twenty years now."

Meeker says they concluded that condoms "reduce the risk of Gonorrhea and HIV in men. But for all the other infections, there is insufficient evidence to show that they reduce the risk at all."

Notice even the language they use says "reduce the risk," but does not say keeps kids safe or protects them, says Meeker.

There are over thirty STD viruses today. At least fifteen million Americans this year will contract a new STD. Two thirds of them will be under 25 years old, says Meeker.

One in five Americans over the age of 12 has genital herpes - a 500% increase since 1976. New studies show that teenage girls have a 46 % chance of contracting HPV at their first sexual encounter - a disease that is directly connected to 99.7% of cervical cancers.

At the current rate, fifty percent of the male population could have Genital Herpes in the near future, says Meeker.

"I've got daughters and I want grandchildren," says Meeker. The NIH says there is insufficient evidence that condoms can protect them, she says.

"I don't know about you, but when I'm looking at a kid in my office and they're sexually active, I consider it a liability issue for me to tell them they are going to be okay if they use a condom."

Meeker says we may see some smart lawyers in the future go up against condom makers and those who recommended their use.

Most of all, "It's not good enough for our kids" says Meeker.

Kids may use them a few times and then stop. The longer kids have sex the less they use them. The earlier they start having sex, the less they use them and the more partners they have, she says.

"A fourteen or fifteen year-old girl having sex---she's done. She will have something; She will be very high risk; Very dangerous stuff; Condom or no condom, it doesn't matter," says Meeker.

There are 80 to 100 sub-types of Human Pappiloma Virus, she says. It is believed that about thirty of them are sexually transmitted. Out of those, a handful causes cancer.

"Here's the good news," she said to the parents. "You and I have everything we need to change the future for our kids."

We vastly overestimate the influence of peers in our kids' lives, says Meeker. It is about adult expectations.

In her research using the best studies she could find, "The number one important factor in a teenager's life keeping them away from drugs, alcohol and sex is parent connectedness, according to the kids. Number two is teacher connectedness; Nothing about peers."

One other protective factor is religiosity. Kids did well who attended a church or temple and understood a significant adult in their life gave them a template and said, "this is my expectation from you. It is great, it is wonderful, go there."

Another protective factor is if a teenager perceives that mom and dad do not want them to be sexually active.

"Teenagers have always wanted to push the envelope and they've always wanted to push the limit. What has changed in twenty years is our limits," says Meeker.

"What has changed is we've backed away. 'Ok, ok, a little more, a little more,' and the kid will keep going."

Meeker says there was a meltdown in their house a week ago, for example.

Their freshman daughter just turned 15. Dad took her and the whole high school skiing team to Alaska for a skiing activity. An 18 year-old on the team fell in love with her daughter. "He's a great kid with morals, goes to church youth, group, the whole nine-yards," says Meeker. After they came home, the phone calls started.

Meeker sat down with her daughter and said "he's a great guy, but you can't go out with him. You've got to tell him." The daughter said ok, but the phone kept ringing and the boy started coming over to the house.

"He made one phone call too many," says Meeker. "Dad picked up the phone."

Dad complimented the boy on being a great guy, a fabulous skiier, but told him "you can't date my daughter. It's just the way it is."

The daughter wailed, moaned and screamed-for twelve hours, says Meeker. "It was horrible, but now she's okay."

We are very afraid to be a brick wall for our kids and are reticent to teach them abstinence, says Meeker.

Parents, fearful their daughters might get pregnant, often ask Meeker to prescribe birth control for their daughters. Meeker tells them no. She says they should be worried about more than pregnancy, which will not kill them, but about AIDS and cervical cancer, which is mostly caused by HPV's. Most doctors' offices will not teach these things, says Meeker.

The answer will not come from doctor's offices. The answer lies with parents, she says.

"Believe it or not, your teenagers want you to raise the bar for them, to expect that they can stay away from sexual activity just like you expect them to stay away from drugs and alcohol and smoking."

We overestimate the power of hormones, says Meeker. Kids aren't sleeping with 4,5,6 or 8 kids and having oral sex because of their hormones. They are doing it because they are sad, confused, and lonely or don't want to be a freak.

You have to work with your children, look them in the eye, have a relationship with them, touch them and let them know they can do it, says Meeker.

There is even an old study that showed how students' IQ's went up when their teachers believed that they could do something.

"You absolutely have to teach your children abstinence," says Meeker. They will love you for it because you are not telling them what not to do, but what they can do.

Meg Meeker, MD has spent the past twenty years practicing pediatric and adolescent medicine and counseling teens and parents. She is board certified by the American Board of Pediatrics and is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics as well as the National Advisory Board of the Medical Institute. A graduate of Mt. Holyoke College in Massachusetts and the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Dr. Meeker completed her pediatric residency at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin in 1987. She subsequently taught medical students and physicians-in-training in Massachusetts at Baystate Medical Center of Tufts University.