Unsafe sex common among Chinese college students: Study

NEW DELHI - Although college goers in China are becoming increasingly open to the idea of sex, they still do not have a strong awareness of safe sex, a new survey has suggested.

The survey that consulted 1,000 students at 10 universities in Guangzhou revealed that some 48 percent of students accepted premarital sex, reports the China Daily.

The Guangdong provincial population and family planning commission and Guangdong provincial sexology association conducted the study

Only 34 percent of respondents said they used condoms.

Nearly 30 percent of respondents said they did not think it was necessary to use condoms.

“Students are becoming more open to sex because they have more knowledge of sexual freedom,” said Zhang Feng, of the Guangdong provincial population and family planning commission.

A regulation allowing marriage between college students, which was implemented in 2005, also partly contributed to the open attitude toward sex among students, said Zhang.

Zhang said that they should improve their awareness of safe sex and noted that about 17 percent of respondents had suffered from sexual diseases.

Zhang attributed the lack of knowledge about safe sex to the way in which many students get their knowledge about sex - from pornography.

The survey said more than 40 percent of respondents said they had looked at porn websites or movies.

“My knowledge about sex would be totally empty if I had not watched porn movies,” said a Guangzhou University student, who declined to be named.

Qiu Hongzhong, of the Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, said inadequate sex education at school and home has helped force students to learn about sex from the Internet.

“There is a severe lack of formal sex education in the country. Most teachers, from primary schools to universities, do not have knowledge about sex. So how can they teach students?” said Qiu. (ANI)