Abstinence programs may target adults, says Bush admin.

In another effort to please its Religious Right constituency, the Bush administration has announced new guidelines allowing federally funded abstinence-education campaigns to target adults.

In late October, USA Today reported that the abstinence-only programs, which have traditionally counseled pre-teens and teens, were being expanded to include adults up to age 29. Religious Right groups, such as James Dobson's Focus on the Family and Don Wildmon's American Family Association, have long lobbied for programs that urge unmarried people to abstain from sex.

The abstinence-only approach has drawn criticism, however, from health activists and some state officials. The Newark Star Ledger reported that New Jersey will not accept the federal funding because it prohibits counselors from talking about contraception. According to the newspaper, New Jersey is the fourth state to reject the aid. (California, Pennsylvania and Maine are the other states.)

David Rebovich, managing director of the Rider University Institute for New Jersey Politics, told the newspaper that the "state's stand draws attention to the Bush administration's very conservative and traditional positions on sex education, which are probably deemed unrealistic...."

James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, a progressive sex education advocacy group, told USA Today that the administration had "stepped over the line of common sense. To be preaching abstinence when 90 percent of people are having sex is in essence to lose touch with reality. It's an ideological campaign. It has nothing to do with public health."