In the last 25 years, the federal government has allocated more than $1.3 billion to abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. But now, President Obama has his first opportunity to eliminate these harmful and ineffective programs that promote a specific religious ideology instead of accurate medical science.

In the next few weeks, President Obama will craft his first budget where he will have the ability to eliminate funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education. He also has the option of choosing to fund comprehensive-sex education programs, which have never received  federal funding before.

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Comprehensive sex education endorsed by health and education professionals, that both encourages teens to abstain from sex and teaches them about contraceptives and barrier methods, reduces sexually transmitted diseases as well as the rate of unintended pregnancies.

In too many schools, students receive incomplete, religiously biased information that focuses solely on abstinence and provides no information about safer sex. There are currently three separate federal funding streams for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, and no dedicated federal funding stream for comprehensive sex education. In last year's budget, funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs totaled $176 million.

Millions of federal dollars are offered to states that agree to teach a strict abstinence-only education program, but half of the country has turned down this funding. As of 2009, twenty-five states have opted out of receiving Title V abstinence-education funding that requires that schools use a stringent eight-point definition of "abstinence-only education." This eight-point definition prohibits programs from advocating contraceptive use or discussing contraceptive methods except to emphasize their failure rates.

Please urge President Obama to eliminate funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs.