Recently published figures confirm that Britain now leads Europe in promiscuity. Health experts are calling the situation a full-blown crisis!
A 2002 report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (unicef) shows that the United Kingdom has the second-highest rate of teenage pregnancies in the Western world, behind only the U.S. At the same time, sexually transmitted diseases (stds) are on the increase. The London-based Daily Mail wrote, “Britain is on the brink of a public health crisis brought about by the spread of sexually transmitted diseases,” adding that “the fertility of an entire generation [is] under threat …” (June 11).
Following the recent release of a report by the Parliamentary Health Select Committee, parliamentarians called the situation “appalling,” referring to the fact that “one in 10 sexually active young women in England is infected with chlamydia, syphilis rates have increased by 500 percent in the last six years and gonorrhea rates have doubled” (Daily Post, Liverpool, June 12). Shadow Health Secretary Liam Fox described the reality as “a ticking time bomb.” Two years ago, a Lancet medical journal study, involving 11,000 men and women ages 16-40, reported that one in 10 adults have at one time caught a sexually transmitted infection (sti).
Present figures speak for themselves. In the last year, “Chlamydia remains the most commonly diagnosed sti, and has increased by 14 percent between 2001 and 2002. Syphilis also rose by 67 percent in males and 33 percent in females. Overall cases of gonorrhea rose by 8 percent in males and 10 percent in females” (Health Protection Agency, July 3).
Arm in arm with all of this, the rate of increase in hiv infection is alarming. In Scotland, for example, recorded hiv cases in 2002 were up 46 percent over the previous year. According to Dr. Rak Nandwani, a consultant for the Sandyford Initiative (a Glasgow-based sexual health clinic), sexually transmitted infections in Scotland have reached epidemic proportions.
The UK sexual health service is groaning under the strain and can’t keep up. Some patients have to wait up to six weeks for an appointment. Others, after treatment, become re-infected and return on numerous occasions for subsequent treatment. David Hinchliffe, chair of the Health Select Committee, said, “The whole sexual health service appears to be a shambles. … I do not use the word crisis lightly, but … we have a crisis in this area of policy—professionals are frankly crying out for help and they are not getting that help” (Guardian, June 11).
It is estimated that the cost of a nationwide screening would be about £96 million (us$154 million) a year, which is double what the government spends on its entire sexual health strategy!
There is a cause for such crises! Is Britain willing to take responsibility for its own actions?
Among conservatives there is an outcry about the very “health strategy” that has been employed in recent years. The question they raise is, How can anyone be surprised by these tragic results when the young are following role models—and receiving the type of sex education—that point them in the direction of promiscuity?
Here are just a few examples of the kind of advice “experts” are cited as being responsible for:
“Girls in Surrey, as young as 11, were advised to stock up on contraceptives for the Millennium holiday. The advice was in a Health Authority leaflet handed out in December 1999 at a Catholic school” (Daily Mail, June 11). In April 2000, a Berkshire Health Authority newsletter, advertising “gay pubs” and encouraging children to participate in a homosexual beauty contest, was circulated to secondary schools. Also, a video encouraging children of 14 to experiment with sex was made available to 180 schools. In August 2000, sex-advice charity Brook gave 14-to-16-year-olds a “Good Grope Guide.” “Nice girls feel sexy and nice girls make love,” said the 18-page booklet. Then, in January 2001, it was revealed that morning-after pills were being dosed out by school nurses to girls as young as 11 without their parents’ knowledge.
The results of this kind of advice and encouragement toward promiscuity can be seen in the lifestyles of these young girls as they grow older. It has become common for many, who have multiple sexual partners, to make a good living from the welfare the government doles out to them for each new, fatherless child.
Even the Church of England, traditionally the bastion of British moral standards, has moved with the tide, as it condones sex between single people. In a report released in July, the church, referring to “covenanted relationships,” states that “any man and woman who make a lifelong commitment to each other are in such a relationship, whether or not they are married” (Telegraph, July 30; emphasis mine). On the question of homosexuality in the church, much of the clergy has come out in support of it, with the bishop of Oxford, Richard Harries, saying he wants “to see a more ‘gay and lesbian friendly’ church” (bbc News, June 26).
Is it any wonder Britain has slipped so low into decadence, promiscuity and perversity—into the shoes of Sodom and Gomorrah?
The fact is, Britannia has lost sight of God!
An increasingly large segment of the British population no longer even believes in God and His Son Jesus Christ, as reflected in dismal church attendance figures. (Today, of the UK’s nearly 60 million population, barely 1 million attend church weekly.) In 1999, the Catholic newspaper the Tablet and the Daily Telegraph commissioned a survey that revealed that only 45 percent of the 1,015 British subjects questioned believed Jesus Christ really is the Son of God—a tremendous fall from 71 percent in 1957. What is more, 14 percent didn’t even know who Jesus was! Sadly, while 65 percent claimed to still believe in God, only 28 percent retained the traditional view of a “personal God”—the other 37 percent saw God as an abstract “spirit or life force.”
The moral backbone of a country that once led the greatest empire this world has ever known, basing its moral realities on the Ten Commandments, has definitely fractured, splintered and crumbled.
How can the people of Britain reverse the morally depraved state of their nation if so many don’t even believe in God, let alone the moral standards He has set for us?
The good news for Britain, the U.S. and the other nations that once formed part of the 12 tribes of Israel, as well as the whole world spiritually lost in religious confusion, is that soon God is about to intervene and establish right standards. God is going to clean Ephraim up! (Hos. 11:9-11). All people will worship the one true God, who has all the correct answers and represents the only way to true, lasting happiness.
This wonderful, prophesied future will only become a reality, however, after Britain has suffered punishment during the Tribulation for its great sins against its God (Matt. 24:21). Britain, as a nation, will repent of those sins and make a complete about turn. Eventually, the British people will be used as examples of loyal followers of Christ, to inspire others to fulfill their incredible human potential!