YES WE CAN! News/Alert
Liberal, Progressive, Secular, Green, & Humane

Prepared Letter on Line to Your Senators:
Stop abstinence education from being
funded in health care reform
STRIP HATCH AMENDMENT!

<http://action.secular.org/t/5367/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=27972>
http://action.secular.org/t/5367/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=27972

PLEASE edit version at web site (see word choice in first line),
or directly send.  Sample below.

Find your federal legislators:
Congress.org <http://www.Congress.org>
Senate <http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm>
House of Representatives <http://www.house.gov>

SOURCE:  Secular Coalition for America <ale...@secular.org>

Last week, the Senate Finance Committee passed an amendment by Sen. Orrin
Hatch (R-Utah) that authorized $50 million dollars for
abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in the Baucus' health care reform
bill.

The good news is that abstinence-only programs are not funded in any other
health care bill in the House and Senate, and President Obama has clearly
stated that he does not want these sex education programs to be funded.

The bad news is that the Secular Coalition has learned that many Senators on
both sides of the aisle are afraid of opposing these failed sex education
programs because they don't want to offend their religious and socially
conservative constituents.

The American Academy of Pediatrics states that, "Abstinence-only programs
have not demonstrated successful outcomes with regard to delayed initiation
of sexual activity or use of safer sex practices... Programs that encourage
abstinence as the best option for adolescents, but offer a discussion of HIV
prevention and contraception as the best approach for adolescents who are
sexually active, have been shown to delay the initiation of sexual activity
and increase the proportion of sexually active adolescents who reported
using birth control."

Tell your Senators that, as a nontheistic constituent, you believe their
priority should be to protect the best interests of young people based on
scientific evidence.  Tell them that you do not want another dime of your
money going towards abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education, which is a
program based on religious ideology, and does not promote the best interests
of young people.

The amendment to fund abstinence programs passed by only one vote in the
Senate Finance Committee. Abstinence-only-until-marriage programs ignore
scientific research, the recommendations of medical experts, overwhelming
public opinion ­ and basic common sense. Tell your Senators that you want
them to do everything in their power to remove funding for this program in
the final health care reform bill.

LETTER:  Select words in red, or fill in your own.

Dear Senator,

As a constituent of yours and a nontheistic/religious American, I am greatly
troubled by an amendment that passed in the Senate Finance Committee that
would re-commit $50 million dollars of tax-payer money to fund failed
abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. I am writing to ask you to do
whatever you can to strip the Hatch Amendment from the final Health Care
Reform bill in the Senate.

Since 1997, the federal government has allocated more than $1 billion for
abstinence-only-until marriage programs. Educational programs on sexuality
for teens should protect the health and safety of young people -- not
promote a particular religious perspective.

The American Academy of Pediatrics states that, "Abstinence-only programs
have not demonstrated successful outcomes with regard to delayed initiation
of sexual activity or use of safer sex practices... Programs that encourage
abstinence as the best option for adolescents, but offer a discussion of HIV
prevention and contraception as the best approach for adolescents who are
sexually active, have been shown to delay the initiation of sexual activity
and increase the proportion of sexually active adolescents who reported
using birth control."

Abstinence-only-until-marriage programs promote a conservative religious
perspective over a secular science-based approach to sex education and it is
important to American young people that only these secular science-based
approaches be funded by the government.

Please do not succumb to pressure by religious conservatives to continue
spending millions of dollars on ineffective, religiously biased sex
education programs.

Thank you.

October 13, 2009
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