Wanganui's Catholic Church has poured cold water on the return of the "No Rubba No Hubba" safer sex campaign.
The campaign was launched by Health Minister Annette King in November in an effort to reduce high rates of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in sexually active teenagers by encouraging them to use a condom every time they have sex.
The campaign ended in February but following a promising evaluation, the advertisements will be broadcast again for the next six weeks.
St Mary's Catholic Church priest Father David Bell said restraint was always the best form of protection.
"We don't think it's helpful to promote sex. I think it is selling our young people short because it doesn't completely prevent STIs.
"Our message is sex outside marriage is wrong and we advocate for people to restrain.
"I wonder how successful the campaign was and how they judge the success," he said.
Wanganui High School principal Warwick Maguire said anything that promoted safe sex was good, but abstinence was always the best option. Wanganui Youth Services Trust nurse Desiree Watt said the advertisements have had a wonderful effect, with an increase in young people wanting to be tested.
"It has certainly made people aware of getting checked and taking responsibility for their health. We have had an increase in people being tested and have found more people with STIs that may otherwise not have known," Ms Watt said.
Taumata Hauora Trust project co-ordinator Jay Rerekura said the advertisements were funny, but didn't really know if the point was reaching its intended targets.
"The ads are hard case, but I wonder if the message got across. The feedback I have had has been that it's a funny, but not much else. "I think there needs to be more consultation with young people, because it doesn't seem like they have done very much so far," he said.
Campaign spokesperson Sally Hughes said the challenges of mounting a safer sex campaign don't finish when the advertising stops, and even evaluating the summer campaign had been demanding.
"We know that phone surveys asking questions about sex, practically of teenagers, face strong barriers in terms of firstly getting to teenagers and then getting them to talk frankly about the campaign.
"For this campaign, the ministry opted for using an on-line method for evaluation, something which is used overseas, but which is relatively new to New Zealand.
"Compared to phone surveys it is likely that we got a stronger response from teenagers with freer and franker comments," she said.
The key findings from the survey were that 49 percent of the respondents indicated the campaign had definitely or probably increased their likelihood of using a condom. The proportion of respondents who said they would still have sex if no condom was available decreased significantly between the pre and post campaign, from 46 precent to 36 percent.
All other youth health providers who were contacted by the Chronicle did not want to comment.
Catholics won't rubber stamp safer sex campaign
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