HIV-related knowledge and behaviors among high school students - selected U.S., 1989

Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, June 15, 1990

Editorial Note. From 1988 to 1989, the number of state, territorial, and local departments of education that conducted surveys about HIV-related knowledge and behaviors among high school students nearly tripled (from 15 to 42). This increase represents a notable step toward establishment of state, territorial, and local school-based surveillance systems for monitoring priority health-risk behaviors among high school students.

HIV-related knowledge and behaviors among high school students are cause for concern throughout the United States. Most importantly, these surveys indicate that many students are at risk for HIV infection because they use IV drugs and share needles or because they have sexual intercourse with multiple partners. Many of these findings are similar to those from surveys conducted in 1988 [1].

Although the findings in this report are based on a combination of probability and nonprobability samples and comparisons of data among sites should be made with caution, these results have assisted in planning and evaluating broad programs in

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TABLE I. Summary -- cases of specified notifiable diseases, United States, cumulative, week ending June 9, 1990 (23rd Week)

                                      Cum. 1990
AIDS                                    18,962
Anthrax                                      -
Botulism:  Foodborne                         1
           Infant                           17
           Other                             2
Brucellosis                                 20
Cholera                                      1
Congenital rubella syndrome                  1
Diphtheria                                   1
Encephalitis, post-infectious               46
Gonorrhea:  civilian                   288,434
            military                     4,031
Leprosy                                     82
Leptospirosis                               16
Measles:  imported                         576
          indigenous                     9,444
Plague                                       -
Poliomyelitis, Paralytic (*)                 -
Psittacosis                                 59
Rabies, human                                -
Syphilis:  civilian                     21,345
           military                        123
Syphilis, congenital, age < 1 year           -
Tetanus                                     22
Toxic shock syndrome                       143
Trichinosis                                  12
Tuberculosis                             8,886
Tularemia                                   26
Typhoid fever                              148
Typhus fever, tickborne (RMSF)              87
  (*) Three cases of suspected poliomyelitis have been reported
in 1990; five of the 13 suspected cases in 1989 were confirmed
and
all were vaccine-associated.

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individual cities and states. For example, the Michigan Department of Education used results from its 1988 and 1989 surveys to assist the State Board of Education in supporting school-based HIV education programs that help students avoid behaviors that result in HIV infection.