Sex, booze and drugs

It's well known that drinking too much alcohol and taking drugs can affect your well-being and sexual health. They can make you emotionally less sensitive and on a practical note clumsy.

Here are some of the effects too much booze and drugs can have:

• Lower your inhibitions and impair your judgement. As a result you are much more likely to take risks such as having sex when you might not have otherwise had it, having unprotected sex or doing something you later regret.
• Numb your senses and make otherwise simple tasks like putting on a condom more difficult. You are more likely to mess up by not putting it on properly or snagging it with a finger nail and not realising – making what would have been safe sex – unsafe.
• Lead to poor sexual performance. For men too much booze and drugs can stop you from getting and keeping an erection and for women it can stop you from producing enough natural lubrication to make sex pain free and enjoyable.
• Lead to long-term health problems For men booze can lower you sperm count, so although you may not want children now later on in life a low sperm count can make it difficult for your partner to get pregnant. For women long-term heavy drinking can cause your periods to stop.
• Lead to depression and totally wipe out your sexual desire.

If you have sex with someone who is so drunk or high on drugs that they do not know what they are doing or perhaps they are even unconscious you are breaking the law.