{"id":698609,"date":"2026-05-27T21:05:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T21:05:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698609\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T21:05:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T21:05:17","slug":"one-in-10-australian-teens-relying-on-withdrawal-method-half-not-using-condoms-as-stis-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698609\/","title":{"rendered":"One in 10 Australian teens relying on withdrawal method, half not using condoms as STIs rise"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australia’s largest study of teen sexual health paints a concerning picture of intimate partner violence and unsafe sex against a backdrop of rising sexually transmitted infections.<\/p>\n

One in five of the 4,400 teens aged 14 to 18 surveyed by La Trobe and the Australian government said they had experienced unwanted sex.<\/p>\n

Data shared exclusively with the ABC showed among the 61 per cent of teens who reported having been in a relationship, 37 per cent felt scared of a partner and 18 per cent experienced physical violence.<\/p>\n

“Those findings, actually, I found quite surprising and quite shocking,” said Professor Jennifer Power, the lead researcher on the 8th National Survey of Australian Secondary Students and Sexual Health (SSASH).<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Year 10 students are learning about sex at a Melbourne senior college.\u00a0 (ABC News: Andrew Ware)<\/p>\n

One solution might be found in classrooms like those at Lakeview Senior College in Melbourne’s outer suburbs, where Anne Atcheson from Sexual Health Victoria is educating year 10 students.<\/p>\n

She travels the state providing these classes to schools as a service, and says the results have been impressive.<\/p>\n

“The most important thing is to take away stigma [so] that young people have the language to be able to talk about their own bodies and their own experiences and get help if they need it,” Ms Atcheson said.<\/p>\n

“Without feeling ashamed of that experience or worried about it, or like it’s so awful they can’t go and seek help.”\"A<\/p>\n

Anne Atcheson from Sexual Health Victoria travels to schools as a service and is seeing good results. (ABC News: Andrew Ware)<\/p>\n

As part of the lesson, students are asked to turn to their classmate and ask them the definition of sex.<\/p>\n

“Sex isn’t just pleasure. It’s also a beautiful form of intimacy between two people. It’s also an expression of love,” a student responds.<\/p>\n

Nothing is considered off limits as the students learn about sex, relationships and their own bodies.<\/p>\n

“We do approach the work with a really sex-positive lens which acknowledges risk but also starts with the idea that everyone deserves safe, respectful relationships and sexual relationships if they choose,” Ms Atcheson said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

As part of the lesson, students need to ask their classmate how they define sex. (ABC News: Andrew Ware)<\/p>\n

The socio-economic demographics at Lakeview Senior College are close to the Australian average according to MySchool data.<\/p>\n

There’s a clear diversity of cultures, sexuality and experience and its important to the students that it’s reflected in the lesson.<\/p>\n

“It’s so important for neurodiverse people to have the option and to learn like this,” another student said.<\/p>\n

“Because social cues and physical intimacy can be so confusing.”<\/p>\n

\"Students<\/p>\n

The classes are approached in a sex-positive lens, but also acknowledge risk. (ABC News: Andrew Ware)<\/p>\n

Others noted how hard it could be to discuss sex with parents or to find accurate information online.<\/p>\n

But Professor Power said those conversations, as well as education programs like that at Lakeview, need to be front and centre.<\/p>\n

“There’s an obvious need for us to make sure all of the investment that Australia’s been making in prevention of sexual and intimate partner violence is reaching younger adolescents,” she said.<\/p>\n

Low condom use and the withdrawal method<\/p>\n

The SSASH survey found half of respondents were sexually active, typically after turning 15.<\/p>\n

Many sexually active teenagers were taking risks with their sexual health, with condom use at some of the lowest recorded levels since the survey began in 1992.<\/p>\n

While 80 per cent had a condom available the last time they had sex, only 51 per cent used it, and one in 10 relied on the withdrawal method.<\/p>\n

Mums doing heavy lifting on sex ed<\/a><\/p>\n

A report finds mothers do more of the sex education at home, raising concerns that young boys are missing out on key information from their dads.<\/p>\n

Professor Power suspects the reduced use of condoms could be partly due to improvements in HIV prevention and treatment, and the expansion of contraception options.<\/p>\n

“It is a problem because we have increasing rates of some common sexually transmissible infections in Australia and an increasing rate of syphilis, which is a really complicated and wicked problem and something that we do need to get on top of,” she said.<\/p>\n

The research also found just 12 per cent of young people had been for a STI check-up, with barriers including parents, not having their own Medicare card, or a lack of knowledge.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Jennifer Power says young people are looking for more in-depth and practical conversations. (ABC News: Patrick Stone)<\/p>\n

While 94 per cent of respondents received some form of sex education at school less than half found it relevant.<\/p>\n

“They’re looking for more in-depth, more detailed and practical conversations than what they’re receiving in sex education,” Professor Power said.<\/p>\n

The research also found fewer than one in four received sex education in years 11 and 12, at the ages they are more likely to be sexually active.<\/p>\n

The birds and the bees not cutting it anymore<\/p>\n

Rania Omar, 26, from Western Sydney said “lacklustre” sex education failed to keep her safe.<\/p>\n

Ms Omar is part of a youth advisory board attached to the survey that aims to improve young people’s experiences by sharing firsthand accounts.<\/p>\n

“We need to talk about sex more \u2026 the lack of education and the amount of shame around it is only hurting us and hurting our communities,” Ms Omar said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Young people such as Rania Omar say they don’t want to be babied anymore. (ABC News: Billy Cooper)<\/p>\n

“And young people are seeing that, and we’re sick of it and we’re going to change it.”<\/p>\n

She said she would have benefited from sex education that helped identify relationship red flags.<\/p>\n

“I’ve had relationships in the past where they were very unhealthy and I felt uncomfortable, and I felt like things weren’t right,” she said.<\/p>\n

“And although I had that intuition, I didn’t really listen to myself because everyone was like, ‘oh, this is normal’.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Gabbi Colloff says young people are facing issues without enough education. (ABC News: Grant Cummings)<\/p>\n

Gabbi Colloff is also on the board and said sex education needed to empower young people for relationships and the real world.<\/p>\n

“Young people don’t want to be babied anymore. The birds and the bees isn’t going to cut it,” Ms Colloff said.<\/p>\n

“We are experiencing new modern-day issues that without adequate education are in fact hurting us and harming us.”<\/p>\n

The report called for governments to support schools to deliver more meaningful, relatable and consistent relationships and sexuality education nationwide.<\/p>\n

The questions kids ask about sex<\/a><\/p>\n

Young people’s curiosity about sex\u00a0is nothing new, but access to the internet and the terabytes of graphic pornography it hosts has given rise to a fresh set of concerns: if kids go looking for answers to their awkward questions on Google, what will they find?<\/p>\n

Sex and consent resources have increased in schools in recent years with national curriculum resources available from primary school onwards.<\/p>\n

The challenge is one that goes well beyond the school gate and to society, according to the researchers.<\/p>\n

Professor Power encouraged adults to have open, judgement-free, meaningful conversations with teenagers in their lives.<\/p>\n

“What we need to be doing is opening conversations with young people and that means asking questions, finding out what they think, being curious \u2026 and actually we might learn some things from young people if we do that.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia’s largest study of teen sexual health paints a concerning picture of intimate partner violence and unsafe sex…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":698610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,3288,44,340396,97305,41818,340395],"class_list":["post-698609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-contraception","tag-news","tag-relationships-and-sexuality-education","tag-sex-ed","tag-sex-education","tag-teen-sex"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/698610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}