Kate Sheppard of TAPPED reposts some interesting information that goes against any number of classic social-conservative assumptions about race, class, income, and promiscuity.

Foreign Policy has an infographic in this month’s issue about sex, and safe sex, around the world. Seems the number of sexual partners grows with income; people in low-income countries average 6.3 partners, while high-income countries average 9.7. People in high-income nations also have sex earlier, and are more likely to have unprotected sex – with nations like Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand at the head of the pack. Also, Icelanders and Germans lose their virginity earliest, and your sexual preference isn’t a very likely determinant of whether or not you use protection. The info comes from the world’s largest survey of sexual behavior, conducted by Durex (the condom purveyor). Fascinating.

She said it here.

Dana Goldstein, also of TAPPED, adds a brilliant point

What strikes me about the sex statistics you cite, Kate, is that they really upturn the stereotype that promiscuity is primarily responsible for the spread of HIV/AIDS in the developing world. Indeed, in Zimbabwe, for example, women’s access to prenatal care is a stronger determinant of a population group’s HIV infection rate than the prevalence of prostitution. Educating women and giving them comprehensive reproductive health care is one of the very best ways to fight AIDS.

And she said it here.

Nuts and bolts of reproductive education and heathcare basics aren’t as, um, sexy as fulminating about, say, abstience, but it’s a better use of aid dollars. (And really, if someone wants to go squandering money on abstinence education it looks like Sweden, Iceland, and Germany have the biggest “crisis” in non-abstienence. And look how their societies are just falling apart! Oh yeah, and if you look at that Foreign Policy infographic, what’s up with Turkey?)