I refer to the article "Sex education alone is not the answer" in A Christian Outlook (The Sunday Times, August 3). It is certainly true that Britain's attempts at curbing Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) and teenage pregnancies have failed miserably. The reasons for this are many, and not simply that sex education has failed, as the article implies.

Among other things, what has been questioned is the actual message delivered, and this has been, and still is, a subject of much debate.

Unfortunately it is still far from clear as to which sex education programme actually works. Too many programmes have been prejudiced by pre-conceived ideas and personal agendas.

Your correspondents imply that an abstinence programme can be remarkably successful. While abstinence most certainly has a role to play in any STI prevention programme, the general consensus of scientific opinion is that by itself it is actually counter-productive and results in earlier sexual experimentation.

Rather than discussing Britain's problems, perhaps we should concentrate on our own. We too have an increasing problem with teenage pregnancies and STIs.

It is worth recording that 34 per cent of patients seen in the GenitoUrinary Clinic (Boffa Hospital) are aged 20 to 29. Teenagers constitute 13.2 per cent of the total number of patients seen.

When asked about their sexual partner(s), 39 per cent describe them as casual, i.e. they cannot be traced as, more often than not, not even a first name is known or remembered; 72 per cent never use condoms, and only 19 per cent of the females use any form of contraception.

Clearly our young people are sorely unprepared for the responsibilities of sexual relationships. Whichever sexual health messages, irrespective by whom, are being propagated is clearly totally inadequate.

Rather than denigrating other people's efforts, we need to learn from them, and calmly and, above all, scientifically study what we can usefully do to help our young people.

One would like to think that whatever our background our ultimate aim is the same, i.e. the wellbeing of tomorrow's adults.

Young people should not suffer because of ignorance, ours as well as theirs.