Recently the results of a study conducted by the CDC splashed across news headlines: “1 in 4 teen girls has an STD.” Many of the major news networks went on to include a handful of other statistics from the study, which were released on Tuesday at a press conference in Chicago.
Amidst the lock-up-your-daughters frenzy of these bold-faced headlines, nobody seemed to question why only teenage girls were selected for a study regarding STDs and not teenage boys as well. Curiously, there also seemed to be no question of the puzzling statistic, repeated by every major news outlet, that nearly half of the African-American girls in the study had at least one STD.
The study may have, understandably, focused on girls as opposed to boys because STDs tend to manifest themselves more severely in women than they do men. The study might have been an attempt to bring needed attention and funding to the area of womens health. The results may have been released in the manner of a press report to trigger awareness and action in medical communities.
However, given that only 838 girls were surveyed in this study, with no further details provided regarding the demographics of this population, drawing broad generalizations about teenage girls based on this study alone is dangerous, and indeed smacks of bias. Women, particularly minority women, have long been unjustly targeted as populations responsible the spread of STDs, and thus populations that must be controlled. This flawed theory is only encouraged by selective statistics and headlines such as the one above. Though the numbers may draw attention to the problem of STDs, they do so in a manner that unequally assigns blame. Given that it takes two to tango
-Roopali Malhotra