Don't take a holiday from safer sex!

Holiday-makers, and young people in particular, face serious health problems due to risky sexual behaviour when abroad and receive little preventative advice or appropriate screening when they return, according to a paper published in the British Medical Journal.

The paper's author, consultant Dr Karen Rogstad, highlights a study of holiday-makers who attended a genitourinary medicine clinic within three months of returning. A quarter of those involved in the study had slept with a new partner while away and two-thirds had failed to use condoms or had used them haphazardly. A separate study of holiday-makers in Tenerife (the Canary Islands) showed that 50 per cent of those aged 25 or younger had had sex with someone new while on holiday, compared to 22 per cent of those over 25.

Clearly, this behaviour is putting young holiday-makers at increased risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases such as genital herpes, as well as more serious conditions such as hepatitis B, syphilis and HIV, unless safer sex practices are used. According to Dr Rogstad, more widespread education is vital: "Preventative advice should be offered to all holiday-makers, particularly those going to the developing world. Young people should be encouraged to seek health screening on return from holiday."

Source
Sex, sun, sea, and STIs: sexually transmitted infections acquired on holiday
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/329/7459/214