Should Hong Kong universities have condom vending machines? Poll finds 38 per cent of students having campus sex
Concern group calls for wider sex education and STD tests at school clinics
Universities in Hong Kong are not doing enough to educate students about sexual health even as 38 per cent of young people have admitted to having sex on campuses, a survey has found.
According to a study conducted by NGO Aids Concern from July to August this year, 38 per cent of 112 students polled at the city’s eight universities said they had had sex on campus, but 80 per cent said their schools did not provide them with any information on sexual health.
Aids Concern also approached the eight publicly-funded universities to confirm whether they provided tests for sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV at campus clinics.
Only two universities – City University in Kowloon Tong and Education University in Tai Po – said they offered such tests while other universities declined to answer.
More than 95 per cent of students interviewed said they did not know whether such tests were provided by their universities.
“Universities did not have [adequate sexual health measures] to offer students protection and support,” Aids Concern’s Jim Hoe Kwun-hung said.
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Students in the survey also said it was inconvenient to obtain condoms on campus. When asked on a scale of zero to 10 how easy it was to obtain condoms on campus, students scored an average of 4.4.
Condoms have been sold or freely distributed on campuses in the past year by student organisations at seven universities, but the concern group said there were no condom vending machines installed in student dormitories.
“If a condom vending machine is available in every dormitory, it would be more likely that students would engage in safe sex,” Hoe said.
He also called on universities to also increase teaching resources for sex education.
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According to the concern group, which reviewed existing information on safe sex made available to university students, the University of Hong Kong was the only institution offering regular sex education workshops. These run once or twice each academic year on campus.
Similar surveys have been previously carried out on campuses. A poll done by the student union of Chinese University in 2012 found that around 20 per cent of 1,175 students interviewed have had sex on campus.
In 2013, a survey commissioned by concern group Women’s Health Alliance found that close to 40 per cent of 1,650 local university students did not use contraceptives every time they had sex.
Education sector lawmaker Ip Kin-yuen said sex education was vital for university students.
“Students are rather independent by the university stage, which could affect their attitudes to sex,” he said, adding that sex education should not be limited to just primary and secondary schools.
