Our view: A sensible plan
A recent curriculum proposal by the Midland Public Schools to introduce fifth-grade students to the scourge of HIV/AIDS met with a storm of criticism in our online comments section and the letters to the editor section.
At the heart of the criticisms were the assumptions that the course was being forced on students and that somehow HIV/AIDS is solely a sexually transmitted disease and that fifth-graders are "too young and immature" for that kind of knowledge.
According to estimates by the World Health Organization and the United Nations AIDS program, there were roughly 33.2 million people living with HIV at the end of 2007 and during that same year, more than 2.5 million people became infected for the first time. By the end of 2007, 2.1 million people worldwide died of AIDS and related infections, including 330,000 children.
While a large number, up to two-thirds, of HIV infections are in sub-Saharan Africa, the truth of the matter is that HIV/AIDS is the ultimate in non-discrimination.
Still a death sentence after nearly 30 years, HIV/AIDS does not care for the age, sex, race, religion, country of origin, political affiliation or income bracket.
And although sexual transmission is a primary mode of infection for HIV, it is by no means the only method. (When you get right down to it, even the cold and flu are sexually transmitted diseases.)
Anyone who has doubts about this can ask Ryan White's mother. Ryan White, the poster boy for HIV education, became infected through a treatment for hemophilia.
When we reviewed the curriculum change proposed by the MPS administration and teachers, we couldn't find fault with it for two main reasons.
First, HIV/AIDS is a fact of life and will not go away or leave a person untouched because of ignorance or an overprotective community. Kids, as sub-Saharan Africa is finding out to its great tragedy, are not immune to this disease through innocence or fond wishes.
Second, and just as importantly, this curriculum proposal is entirely optional. No student at Midland Public Schools would be allowed to take the course without prior written parental permission.
We are strong vocal supporters of the right and duty of parents to be the lead educators and role models not only in sexual education, but in every aspect of their children's lives.
Even if parents wished to provide proper sex education to their children, most of us are not doctors, nurses or health professionals and do not have the most up-to-date, accurate information available, nor in many cases, the skills to be effective communicators in these areas.
Whether fifth-graders are too young to hear about STIs and HIV/AIDS should be left up to the parents, but we applaud MPS for making accurate, professionally constructed information available to those who decide to make use of it.