• Child health experts also highlight  parental empowerment   

Introducing and promoting sex education is crucial not only to protect children from the unpleasant consequences of sexual abuse and in some cases sexual relationships, but also to empower adults, especially parents, to deal with children in a constructive manner when it comes to matters of sex and reproduction.

Noting this, a group of children’s health and wellbeing experts, yesterday (6), explained to the media why the introduction of sex education should not be delayed anymore in the current context. During a press briefing organised by the Health Ministry’s Health Promotion Bureau, they said that in the attempts to promote the prevention of child sexual abuse, education receives the foremost place.

The matter was discussed in a context where the Ministry of Education had announced that the necessary arrangements have been made to launch new educational publications aimed at providing sex education from today (7).

The National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) Chairman Senior Lecturer Udayakumara Amarasinghe expressed concerns about the imperfect nature of the present mainstream approach towards dealing with child sexual abuse cases. On the one hand, since only a handful of child sexual abuse cases get reported, a large number of cases go unreported and unaddressed. On the other hand, given the fact that the unpleasant impacts of child sexual abuse cases could last a lifetime and affect a person’s social, mental and physical wellbeing, it is important to understand that the traditional reactive approach is not effective. “Merely punishing the culprit does not alleviate the impacts of the crime on the victim. It is difficult to truly compensate the victim for such impacts, even though the legal system provides for various forms of assistance including mental health and compensation,” he said, emphasising that, that is why a well-planned and coordinated approach aimed at minimising the incidence of child sexual abuse cases are important, in which sex education plays a key role.

During the discussion, the Lady Ridgeway Children’s Hospital’s Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist Dr. Darshani Hettiarachchi pointed out the importance of parents fulfilling their duties in protecting children from sexual abuse, adding that parents should also be in possession of an adequate level of sex education, and be aware and vigilant about the warning signs of child sexual abuse.