Sex ed campaign for children with learning disabilities

The It’s My Right! initiative includes a poster campaign and an interactive CD-Rom designed to educate children and teenagers with mild to moderate learning disabilities about sex and relationships.

Posters, which will appear in health, social care and educational settings around the UK, will feature couples with learning disabilities.

The CD-Rom will cover topics including periods, wet dreams and masturbation.

It will also inform viewers of the correct names for genitals and what is appropriate behaviour, both in public and private.

Julie Bentley, chief executive of fpa, said: Expressing your sexuality and enjoying a relationship is something everyone values. But poor sex education and fears about exploitation can stand in the way of this happening for people with learning disabilities.

An fpa survey conducted to coincide with Sexual Health Week found more than 90 per cent of professionals who work with young people that have learning disabilities think their clients face barriers to having sex and relationships.