It has been said time and time again: abstinence-only-until-marriage programs don't work.  President Obama has called for the end of them in his budget and Members of Congress in the House and Senate have held firm by letting abstinence-only-until-marriage funding streams expire. The federal government’s own study of the Title V abstinence-only-until-marriage program found these programs to be completely ineffective at their stated goals. The programs failed to delay sexual initiation—the entire purported purpose of the programs.

And while the healthcare reform debate is dominating the news right now; one thing we're not hearing enough about is the Hatch abstinence-only amendment, an amendment that would have a serious impact on sex education in our classrooms.  Voted into the Senate Finance Committee's version of healthcare reform 12-11, the Hatch Amendment lays out a $50 million funding plan to get failed abstinence-only programs back into our classrooms.

This piece of healthcare reform will directly impact our everyday lives and its key we show our legislators we want sex education grounded in fact that teaches us what we need to know.

The Title V abstinence-only-until-marriage program expired on June 30, 2009 and, at that time, had been refused by nearly half of the states both because of the restrictive nature of the program and the fact that overwhelming evidence has proven these programs to be ineffective and a waste of taxpayer dollars.

For that reason, October 28 has been declared a National Call-In Day for Sex Ed by Advocates for Youth, Catholics for Choice, Choice USA, SIECUS, and RCRC. Thousands of young people across the country and their allies will be demanding the Hatch abstinence-only amendment gets stripped from Healthcare Reform.

We need YOU to speak up today!  Let’s put abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in the history books!

Download the Toolkit and join us on our National Call-In Day, Wednesday, October 28. Call 1-888-423-5983 to reach your Senators’ office. Ask them to only fund a comprehensive approach to sex education and to strip the Hatch abstinence-only amendment from Healthcare Reform.You can find a full script for the call-in day here.

You can also sign on to a petition in support of the which would authorize funding for comprehensive sexuality education.

In Solidarity,

Advocates for Youth, Catholics for Choice, Choice USA, SIECUS, and RCRC