INCLUDING a note from its editor, Whitney Garrison, the new Health & Sexuality page debuted last Monday with an open and honest voice that is refreshing, especially when these topics often can be difficult to broach.
The new section's greatest challenge will be to achieve a balance between the science of health and sexuality and the personality necessary to deliver it to readers. If Garrison and her staff maintain the balance and do not succumb to geek- or Cosmo-speak, the new section should do well.
The page featured as the lead story a piece on various methods of contraception, certainly information that members of the University community can use. Discussion of birth control in high school sexual education often is centered unrealistically on abstinence, and can feature a clinical approach that is difficult for students to relate to. Articles like this are helpful for those readers who don't ask questions or do much research as to what the best method for them may be.
Unfortunately, the piece focuses on protection as a means for birth control more than it does as a means for defense against sexually transmitted diseases. Hopefully, future articles will better address the latter, as STDs are often the consequences that people do not discuss. We hear much about the consequences and ways to deal with pregnancy and HIV, but little about HPV, Chlamydia, gonorrhea, etc.
Also, if this article purports to be a piece on birth control, as the headline suggests, why no mention of emergency contraception and abortion?
The front page of the paper that day featured an article jumping to the Health & Sex page entitled "FDA panel issues drug warning." Unfortunately, the article was laden with problems: A misleading lead, mostly secondhand sources, only surface development of the subject and a failure to tie the subject matter to the University community.
The lead read, "A week ago today the U.S. Food & Drug Administration issued a strengthened warning about the dangers of antidepressants given to children 18 and under." From that, the reader could assume that this article concerns the effects of antidepressants on teenagers. It continues, "While critics of the drugs caution that users of all ages should be concerned, some experts who testified before the FDA last week attribute the problem to over-prescribing the medications to people who are only mildly ill."Readers then knew that the piece could address folks over the age of 18, but what "problem" is the piece addressing, the "dangers of antidepressants given to children 18 and under" or "the over-prescribing" of the medications?
The article quoted from an FDA advisory committee statement, which is OK, but never additionally from an FDA official directly, which is problematic.Quoting only from carefully spun statements is a dangerous practice that the new page (and the rest of the Cav Daily) would do best to avoid.Was an attempt made to contact an FDA spokesperson? Did the author attend the hearings to which she refers? The absence of a Washington dateline suggests that she did not, but the piece reads as if she did, especially in the fourth paragraph, which refers to testimony at the hearings, but cites no source of such testimony.
Other people quoted in the article include Ann Blake Tracy, the executive director of the International Coalition for Drug Awareness, as well as two other experts whose words were attributed to other publications. It can be difficult to get in touch with experts, especially after the release of an FDA warning, but attempts nonetheless must be made.
Perhaps because few people were contacted, the subject of the article was not as fleshed out as it should have been. Why do folks face a danger from antidepressants, simply because of over-prescription? What science did the FDA use to determine that these drugs justified a warning?
There was also little attempt to relate the article to the University community. U.Va. employs a plethora of folks who could have illuminated details about antidepressants and perhaps provided statistics that the article lacked.
Finally, the new Health & Sexuality page featured a "What's your sexual persona?" quiz. Such quizzes can be fun features that attract readers to the page week after week; however, they still need to do so in a tactful manner.Saying "When it comes to sex, I will try almost anything once" pretty much covers the aim of the question; it's needlessly juvenile and tacky to refer in the parenthetical to "a different tunnel." It's important to make sure that the quizzes don't profess to be scientific evaluations, and this one certainly doesn't. It was "loosely inspired by emode.com's Sexuality Personality Quiz," and that's OK once, but it would be wise not to run "loosely inspired" quizzes each week, as these sources might not judge it as inspiration so much as a rip-off.
Starting a new section is a difficult endeavor and, though the Cav Daily has begun with a few glitches that should be avoided (including a few sloppy misspellings: "Prozc," "Zolof" and "Karma Sutra"), it nonetheless has the ability to move on and up.This is just the beginning for this page, and if the staff steers clear of the reporting and editing problems mentioned and manages to maintain the tact necessary for a student newspaper, it should do just fine.
(Emily Kane can reached at ombud@cavalierdaily.com.)
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