News People with intellectual disabilities have a right to sex education

Like young people without disabilities, young people with intellectual disabilities also want to talk about sexuality. They too need sex education. But just as in the Netherlands, it appears that support workers and parents in Bangladesh are not always able to provide this education. They feel uncomfortable about it and do not know where to start.

In this regard, it is important that sex education for young people with intellectual disabilities is provided in a very concrete manner with a lot of visual support, as they have no ability to abstract. This makes developing training materials in a country like Bangladesh extra complicated.

However, it is important for young people with intellectual disabilities to learn to understand their bodies, to learn about sexuality and building relationships so that they develop a good self-image. And because these young people depend on the people around them and have little or no ability to look up information on the internet, we must enable them to learn this. With good sex education, we not only offer them the right to healthy sexual development, but we also take away fears and taboos, thus preventing transgressive behavior and sexual abuse.

Videos as visual support for sex education

In 2016, Niketan began providing sex education for young people with disabilities in Bangladesh. However, over the past few years, it turned out that the module was insufficiently focused on young people with mild intellectual disabilities. Despite the exercises and visual support, the lessons were too cursory and the support workers were insufficiently trained for this specific target group. Niketan has now developed four videos that explain puberty, menstruation, setting boundaries and falling in love in simple language and with a lot of visual support. The videos are in Bengali and supported by sign language.

If you are interested in the videos (which are currently aimed only at girls), please contact Antoinette Termoshuizen and we will send you the link.