Students urged to 'Want respect? Use a condom'

This week Peterborough Regional College is running a student led Teenage Pregnancy campaign for the Department of Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) and Department of Health (DH).

Health and Social Care students are volunteering as peer communicators for part of the ‘Want Respect? Use a Condom’ campaign. They are playing an important role in helping young people take responsibility for their sexual health and raising awareness of high rates of pregnancy and increasing rates of STIs among people in England.

An inflatable bed will be used as the campaign centre piece and the students will hand out leaflets, condom holders and bus pass wallets to help normalise condom usage amongst their peers. All the participating students have received training on how to effectively deliver messages to their peers on sexual health matters before discussing the campaign with their fellow students.

‘Want Respect? Use a Condom’ is a highly targeted communications campaign aimed at sexually active 16 – 18 year olds and aims to persuade them to use a condom by showing them how it will affect what they care about most – their reputation. The main objective of this campaign is to reduce teenage pregnancies in the UK, with a particular focus on priority “hot spot” areas where there are high and increasing under 18 conception rates.

Jo Melvin, Commissioning Officer for teenage pregnancy for NHS Peterborough, said, "I am so pleased that the peer to peer scheme is coming to Peterborough. Roughly half of young people go to friends for help and advice on sexual health and relationships in the first instance, which is why the peer to peer scheme is such a great idea. These young people will be able to get accurate and credible information from the peer supporters who can help them in a confidential and discrete manner. Despite all the sexual health advice and information out there young people are still taking risks. We want young people to delay sex until a time they feel ready and to practice safer sex when they are ready. This scheme is part of our broad spectrum strategy to help young people make informed decisions when it comes to sexual health."

Based on the success of last year’s pilots, the DCSF and Department of Health have been rolling out the ‘Want Respect? Use a Condom’ activity to twenty for areas around the country.