The church auditorium was decked out in streamers and balloons. Kids chatted around tables with piles of Mardi Gras beads and condoms at the center.

Spring Into Love, which began five years ago, is the brainchild of a coalition of L.A. County health advocates trying to bring down STD rates. This year’s event, held in late March, included workshops on healthy relationships and body image, as well as free STD testing.

Ashley Deras, 18, showed a group of students how to safely open a condom wrapper. She said her family almost never talked to her about sex.

“Sexual health was something in my household that was taboo,” Deras, a high school senior, said in an interview. “All I heard was, ‘Don’t get pregnant.’”

Other teens at Spring Into Love sought practical information they hadn’t learned in health class. One boy said he hadn’t known he could get STDs from anal sex. Many said their parents would be mad at them for asking questions about sex at all.

Many health experts say that public health problems are best tackled outside the doctor’s office — that fixing the culture that perpetuates them is more effective than changing a single patient’s behavior. For sexual health, that means combating the stigma around sex.

The county recently created a Center for Health Equity to evaluate the way certain public health issues are intertwined with social factors such as income and education, as well as racial discrimination.

High STD rates are at the top of the center’s list of priorities. In just the past five years, the number of gonorrhea cases in Los Angeles County doubled, with minorities suffering more than most.

“The numbers are only going up,” Gunzenhauser said. “What’s going on is unacceptable.” Read more via Los Angeles Times