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Important dates in Sexual Health History
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American Social Hygiene Association (ASHA)
The American Social Hygiene Association was founded by two dozen people including Grace Dodge, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., and Dr. William Freeman Snow. -
Film - Damaged Goods
Damaged Goods started the trend films that used the subject of venereal diseases by "women of ill repute" (i.e. prostitutes) that targeted soldiers in the 1910s - 1920s. -
White House Conference on Child Welfare
It was at this conference that the goverment decided that sexual education should be taught in schools. -
American Birth Control League (ABCL)
Founded by Margaret Sanger, the American Birth Control League (ABCL), was incorporated under the laws of New York State in 1922. The ABCL was founded under the principles that Children must be: Conceived in love, Born of the mother's conscious desire, and only begotten under conditions which render possible the heritage of health. This group was later incorporated into Planned Parenthood Federation of America. -
The Kinsey Reports
Two books, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953) written by Alfred Kinsey, Wardell Pomeroy and others , are immediately controversial due to the subject matter and the discussion of taboo topics. In both books, sexual habits of men and women were analyzed and compared. -
Playboy Magazine
Playboy Magazine, founded by Hugh Hefner, was the first magazine to publish written and visual stories about sexuality. Young boys and girls have been sneaking peeks at it ever since. -
First Birth Control Pill
Enovid became the first birth control pill approved by the FDA. -
SIECUS
Dr. Mary S. Calderone, a physician at Planned Parenthood, founded the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States to challenge the teachngs of the American Social Hygiene Association, who dominated sexual education at that time. -
Roe vs. Wade
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional a state law that banned abortions except to save the life of the mother. -
Abstinence Laws
Congress passed the Adolescent Family Life Act, known as the chastity law, to encourage adolescents to postpone sexual activity until marriage. -
AIDS epidemic begins
The CDC publishes a Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report describing cases of a rare lung infection in five young, previously healthy, gay men in Los Angeles. The men have other unusual infections as well, indicating that their immune systems are not working. This is the first official reporting of what will become known as the AIDS epidemic. -
Ryan White Diagnosed with AIDS
Ryan White was diagnosed with AIDS at age 13. He and his mother Jeanne White Ginder fought for his right to attend school, gaining international attention as a voice of reason about HIV/AIDS. At the age of 18, Ryan White died on April 8, 1990, just months before Congress passed the AIDS bill that bears his name – the Ryan White CARE (Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency) Act -
Surgeon General C. Everett Koop
U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop announced that the country had to change course on sex education. “There is now no doubt that we need sex education in schools ..at the lowest grade possible,” (which he later identified as Grade 3) and “we have to be as explicit as necessary to get the message across. You can’t talk of the dangers of snake poisoning and not mention snakes.” - C. Everett Koop -
Teen Pregnancy Peak
Teen pregnancy in the united States was at it's highest peak in 1991 with birth rates at 61.8 per 1000 females aged 15-19. -
Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders
In a Q&A session at the 1994 World AIDS Day Conference a conference participant asked Dr. Elders if it might be possible to reduce the spread of AIDS through “more explicit discussion...of masturbation,” as an alternative to heterosexual or homosexual sex.
Dr. Elders answered:
“I think that is something that is a part of human sexuality and it’s a part of something that perhaps should be taught.” -
States reject funds for abstinence-only education
By 2007 23 states including Alaska, Arizona, California, Idaho, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, and Ohio decided against applying for state-based abstinence-only education due to both its restrictions and the requirement that states contribute matching funds. -
Real Education for Healthy Youth Act proposed
Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Representative Barbara Lee (D-CA) introduced the Real Education for Healthy Youth Act which would provide young people with the "comprehensive sexuality education they need to make informed, responsible, and healthy decisions in order to become sexually healthy adults and have healthy relationships." - http://www.siecus.org/
