Advocacy, policy, and legislation

Without any real hope of getting ahead, young people have little incentive to invest in their own education and avoid the pitfalls of harmful habits that they could acquire in adolescence (PAHO, 1998)

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Historically, official policies have neglected the adolescent population, paying attention to them only when their behaviors create problems for adult populations. Compared with children and the elderly, adolescents suffer from few life-threatening illnesses. The adoption of certain behaviors with long-term adverse health effects - such as smoking, substance abuse, unprotected sex with the risk of sexually transmitted infections (STI) and HIV/AIDS- does not generally produce morbidity or mortality in adolescence; rather, the effects and costs of these behaviors show up later in life. Therefore, when societies decide how to invest their health resources, they generally give little importance to the adolescent population, even though, after early childhood, adolescence is the most vulnerable time of life until old age.

Another important concern is the programs targeting adolescents in Latin America and other parts of the world. The attention that adolescents normally receive, if any, is often centered on very specific problem behavior. Since prevention programs are relatively rare, countries have been forced to respond with tertiary level programs which attempt to mend something that is already broken, and perhaps beyond repair (Barker and Fuentes, 1995).

Terciary care efforts usually focus on isolated problem behaviors such as early pregnancy, drug abuse, or juvenile delinquency and lack a holistic approach that targets adolescents, their families, their environment, and the general context in which the behavior occurs.

Steps toward the holistic development of adolescents

As with all stages of life, adolescence involves some key steps that build on the successful completion of earlier stages. Since adolescence is a transitional period between childhood and adulthood, all steps in this period are focused toward completing the transition. Adolescence is the stage in which an individual must establish a satisfactory personal identity and develop interpersonal relations outside the family. These steps that include finding a partner in life, learning to deal responsibly with his emerging sexuality, and developing economic viability through education and the right attitudes and habits. The adolescent's family, peers, neighborhood, school, and other groups can help in these areas--and can also create obstacles that many adolescents cannot overcome on their own. Read more