Sexual behavior and health problems in University students, University of Antioquia, 1991

ABSTRACT

Autorities at the University of Antioquia, Colombia, felt it would be advisable to institute a student orientation program aimed at preventing health problems resulting from risky sexual behavior related to new cultural trends. The purpose of the work reported in this article was to collect information on the existing situation and provide appropriate advice to the Health Division of the University Welfare Office. For this purpose a survey was conducted with the voluntary participation of 836 students enrolled in their final year of study. A survey form containing 45 questions designed to elicit demographic and sexual behavior data was self-administered anonymously by the participating students. Among the participants who were sexually active, 10.9 percent (17.2 percent of the men, 3.3 percent of the women) said they had contracted some variety of sexually transmitted disease (STD). The most common diagnoses were gonorrhea (42 percent), genital warts (23 percent), and genital herpes (19 percent). The risk of contracting STD was 4.2 times greater in those reporting sex with strangers; 3.4 times greater in those reporting four or more sexual partners; and 2.5 times greater in those reporting homosexual relations, as compared to students not practicing such behaviours. Some 28.4 percent of 790 survey respondents or their partners had been pregnant; 49 percent of these pregnancies had terminated in abortions, 77 percent of these being induced abortions (AU)