Bawdy boomers often cast condoms, caution to wind: survey

By Pamela Fayerman, Postmedia News
Ottawa Citizen

VANCOUVER — Baby boomers — especially those newly single — are rediscovering their zest for sex as their children are leaving the nest, a new national survey shows.

But they aren't always practising what they preach to their kids when it comes to safe sex: 70 per cent of survey respondents say they tell their kids to practise safe sex, yet 30 per cent of unmarried boomers admit they've had unprotected sex with a new partner.

An equal proportion said they aren't worried about contracting a sexually transmitted infection (STI).

According to the survey, commissioned by the Canadian Liver Foundation (CLF), those aged 46 to 64 are boldly going where they likely told their kids not to — with one-night stands, multiple sex partners, online dating and failing to use condoms.

"Perhaps it's not surprising that there is a lot of risk-taking going on, judging by the frequent commercials for (male-impotence) products on . . . apple pie mainstream shows like Hockey Night in Canada," said Dr. Eric Yoshida, University of B.C. head of gastroenterology, who is also chair of the CLF medical advisory committee.

Yoshida's patients are those with advancing liver disease, many of whom don't even realize they might have contracted hepatitis from sex or that the main three types of the virus (A, B and C) can be transmitted through sex.

Apart from using condoms for protection, there are vaccines to prevent hepatitis A and B, but not for C. Across Canada, there are 250,000 cases of hepatitis C.

Yoshida said 45 per cent of hepatitis B infections are diagnosed in baby boomers.

Younger people have a much lower risk of getting it because of immunization programs for infants and school-age children.

Newly single baby boomers who have been out of the dating scene should realize the risk of contracting several types of sexually transmitted infections, he said. But the national survey of nearly 1,000 baby boomers found that many people are naive about this.

While the liver foundation is mostly concerned with hepatitis as an STI, public health agencies like the BC Centre for Disease Control track other reportable STI's like HIV/AIDS, chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis. STIs like herpes and HPV (human papillomavirus) are considered common but aren't subject to mandatory reporting.

Dr. Mark Gilbert, physician epidemiologist at BCCDC, said baby boomers who are being bolder about their sexual behaviours constitute one factor driving the rising incidence of some STIs — but does more frequent testing.

"There is a need for anyone, regardless of age, to think about STIs because people can get infected at any age," he said, adding that even though baby boomers may not worry about pregnancy, condoms are the best insurance against STIs.

If baby boomers are in new relationships or having sex with multiple partners, they should tell their doctors so that they can do routine screening for such infections, he suggested.

According to the 2009 BCCDC STI surveillance report, there were 11,173 new cases of genital chlamydia in B.C. (including 320 women over age 40 and 458 men); 1,307 cases of gonorrhea, (50 women over age 40 and 244 men); 216 cases of syphilis (eight women over 40 and 83 men); 338 cases of HIV (29 women over age 40 and 145 men); and 91 new cases of AIDS (20 women over age 40 and 55 men).

The survey of 877 baby boomers' sexual behaviours and attitudes was sponsored by GlaxoSmithKline, one of the makers of hepatitis vaccines. The sponsorship was given as an unrestricted grant to CLF.

Leger Marketing says the survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.3 percentage points and is considered accurate 19 times out of 20.

Some of the findings in the survey:

-82 per cent of baby boomers believe it's important to have an active sex life at every age.

- 57 per cent feel freer about sex.

- 81 per cent say it's important their kids use protection during sex; 70 per cent have doled out such advice.

- 16 per cent admit they don't always follow their own advice to practise safe sex.

- 30 per cent of unmarried boomers have had unprotected sex with a new partner.

- 33 per cent of unmarried boomers have done online dating.

- 40 per cent of men and five per cent of women are open to one-night stands.

Original link: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/life/story.html?id=3624878