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Young Britons indulge in ‘unsafe’
holiday sex
12 November, 2007
Almost one out of four young
Britons has sex with a new partner
while abroad, and half of their
partners happens to be fellow Britons.
Around a fifth of young Britons claim
to have had sex with at least one new
partner abroad over a five-year
period, a research has shown.
A study, appearing in Sexually
Transmitted Infections, published by
British Medical Journal, suggests that
many young people in their teens and
early 20s are not very careful when it
comes to “holiday romance.”
Of those surveyed, almost a quarter of
men and one in six women between the
ages of 16 and 24 said they had
experienced sex with someone new while
overseas.
As per the survey, British men had two
partners abroad in the five years
covered by the survey, whereas women
had one partner. In certain cases, a
few men had sex with as many as 13
women while abroad.
Half of those taking part in the
survey said their holiday partners
were British, and more than one in
three Britons had sex with a person
from another European country. British
or European partners were chosen to
minimize the chances of contracting
HIV.
On the risk of HIV, respondents cited
North America, Thailand and Kenya as
high-risk countries.
The report also found that one in 10
men and one in 12 women who had sex
while abroad thought the HIV risk was
high.
British men were “significantly” more
likely than women to have sex with
Asian and North American partners.
It was revealed that the young people
were apparently unaware of the risk of
getting sexually transmitted diseases
other than HIV.
The findings come out from interviews
with a random sample of 12,000 men and
women aged 16 to 44 who took part in
the 2000 National Survey of Sexual
Attitudes and Lifestyles (NATSAL).
Nearly 14% of all the men questioned
between May 1999 and February 2001 and
over 7% of the women said they had
indulged in sex with a new partner
abroad in the five years before. And,
this sort of casual sex accounted for
a 10th of all men’s partnerships and
one in 20 of all women’s partnerships.
The researchers, led by Dr Catherine
Mercer from the Centre for Sexual
Health and HIV Research at University
College London, wrote in Sexually
Transmitted Infections, “A substantial
minority of young, unmarried people
form new sexual partnerships abroad.
Those who have new partners abroad are
likely to have higher-risk sexual
lifestyles more generally, and to be
at higher risk of sexually transmitted
infections.”
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