�"[P]ro-choice, pro-family planning" Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D) is in "danger of legitimizing the ethical fraud of abstinence-only education" if he accepts federal abstinence education grants to be distributed by the state Department of Health and Human Services, a Philadelphia Daily News editorial says. According to the Daily News, Pennsylvania has non accepted federal funding for abstinence-only education since 2003, but the state Health Department is preparing an application for about $1.7 million in grants this year. In a statement, Rendell acknowledged the "limited potency" of these programs, but said it's important to teach abstinence and does not want to "stand in the way" of groups victimization the funding, according to the editorial.
However, "every legitimate scientific study" of abstinence-only education has found that these programs do "more than harm than good," the editorial says, adding that the programs provide "medically inaccurate" info by mentioning contraceptive methods�"only to say that they fail, not that they protect against pregnancy" and sexually transmitted infections. Most of the $1.5 1000000000 the union government has spent on abstinence-only programs in the past 10 years has gone to faith-based organizations "because ethical educators and health professionals won't have anything to do with these programs," the Daily News says. If Pennsylvania applies for funding for the abstinence-only programs, "it would be saying it's OK for our kids to get inaccurate and dangerous misinformation, as foresightful as soul else tells the lies," the editorial says, final, "These dishonored programs are just the kind that a pro-choice, pro-family planning Democratic regulator should want to standstill in the way of" (Philadelphia Daily News, 8/22).
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