Its your responsibility as a sexually active adult to know how to protect your sexual health and also the sexual health of anyone you have sex with. You need to know about safer sex, sexually transmitted diseases and what to do if you think you're at risk.
Even if you don't plan to have sex any time soon finding out about safer sex will ensure that you are protected when you do. This section of the Online Survival Guide will give you the basics and you can use the links at the bottom of the page to learn more.
Crucial: Safer Sex means always using a condom if you have vaginal, oral or anal sex.
An STI, also called a sexually transmitted disease (STD), is passed from one person to another during sex. Some affect only the genitals (sexual body parts) and the parts of your body that urine passes through, others like HIV and syphilis can go on to damage other parts of the body and make you very ill. When spread through oral sex it may infect the mouth and throat.
STIs, including HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis and chlamydia, are on the rise in the UK, especially among young people. Know the facts:
Crucial: The best protection against STIs like HIV is a condom. Always use a condom with a new sexual partner, even if you are using another form of contraception.
If you are worried that you might have been exposed to a sexual infection, you can go along and get tested. People sometimes chose to do this when they are getting serious with a regular partner, to make sure they are healthy before trying for a baby or stopping using safer sex. Sometimes people just get tested for peace of mind.
If you are regularly sexually active with more than one partner, particularly if you do not use condoms, you should regularly visit a GP or GUM (genito-urinary medicine) clinic to be tested. GUMs are free, confidential, non-judgmental and available to people of any age.
In Oxfordshire, there are special drop-in Sexual Health sessions, called Wellsafe, for young people at the GUM clinics in Banbury and Oxford, but you can also get treated at the GUM clinics at other times, or by your own GP.
Sometimes a GUM clinic will contact you and ask you to come in for treatment. This means you have been named as a sexual contact by someone they are treating for an STI. You should always go in and get tested, even if you feel fine. You can easily have an infection and not be aware of it.
Key Link:
These symptoms need to be checked out by a doctor, even if you don't think you're at risk of an STI:
I was referred to the Harrison clinic [GUM clinic in Oxford] by a doctor who was worried I had Pelvic Inflammatory Disease. This is a really serious condition [often caused by an untreated STI] that can cause infertility, so I was frantic. I was an emergency case, so it was a long wait, but when the doctors did see me they were all really nice. They asked if I wanted them to write to my GP. You can say no, but I said yes as I wanted to keep my doctor informed, and the doctors have to keep information like that confidential anyway. They gave me the option to be tested for everything, including AIDS, and I said yes because I thought why not, you might as well know. It was pretty distressing, I was in lots of pain, and very tired as I hadn't been able to sleep the previous night, but the staff did what they could to make me feel better. After I'd been tested, I saw a health worker who made sure I understood how to take the pills, and sorted out telling my boyfriend, and gave me advice about sex and so on. I think everyone expected that there might be problems with my boyfriend but actually it was fine because we were so much in love it really didn't matter. – Anon, Oxford
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