I can't tell you how ironic (in that cosmic sort of way) that I would mention abstinence based sex-education (in my previous post) only to have this story hit my inbox within a few minutes of my posting it.

Sex education classes that focus on encouraging children to remain abstinent can convince a significant proportion to delay sexual activity, researchers reported Monday in a landmark study that could have major implications for the nation's embattled efforts to protect young people against unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.

In the first carefully designed study to evaluate the controversial approach to sex ed, researchers found that only about a third of 6th and 7th graders who went through sessions focused on abstinence started having sex in the next two years. In contrast, nearly half of students who got other classes, including those that included information about contraception, became sexually active.

Emphasis mine.  I can't tell you how shocked I am to see this.  So I expect all of those who disparaged abstinence in sex education to apologize to us in 5-4-3-2-1....feh what was I thinking.  The anti-religious zealots will never apologize for calling us anti-science - even when THEY are the ones (once again) making their decisions in a less than scientific manner.

"I think we've written off abstinence-only education without looking closely at the nature of the evidence," said John B. Jemmott III, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, who led the federally funded study. "Our study shows this could be one approach that could be used."

Emphasis mine.  Now why should schools and parents care about what this study says?

"This new study is game-changing," said Sarah Brown, who leads the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. "For the first time, there is strong evidence that an abstinence-only intervention can help very young teens delay sex and reduce their recent sexual activity as well."

The new study is the first to evaluate an abstinence program using a carefully "controlled" design that compared it directly to alternative strategies -- considered the highest level of scientific evidence.

"This takes away the main pillar of opposition to abstinence education," said Robert Rector, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation who wrote the criteria for federal funding of abstinence programs. "I've always known that abstinence programs have gotten a bad rap."

Even long-time critics of the approach praised the new study, saying it provided strong evidence that such programs can work and may deserve taxpayer support.

"One of the things that's exciting about this study is that it says we have a new tool to add to our repertoire," said Monica Rodriguez, vice president for education and training at the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States.

Emphasis again mine.

This is a great example of why people are getting so tired of agenda based "science".  Conservatives don't have problems with science - it is the agenda that some of these supposed scientists push when they skew the results.  As Joe Friday used to say - just the facts ma'am - just give us the facts and let us decide from there.