Purpose -The purpose of the paper is to investigate how young people are using school-based sources of sex and relationships education (SRE) to obtain information and advice. Design/methodology/approach -The paper shows how anonymous self-completion questionnaires were administered to young people aged between 12 and 19 years in three secondary school and six out-of-school youth settings (n ¼ 401). Follow-up focus group interviews were conducted with 12 groups of young people from the school and out-of-school settings (n ¼ 57). Findings -The paper finds that school lessons were the most frequent source of sex and relationships information for many young people. Lessons were reported to be most useful for students who were male, younger and more educationally engaged. School lessons were widely criticised by young people as predominantly focusing on biological aspects of sex and relationships and lacking a discursive or participatory element. Young people perceived a diminishing commitment to SRE by teachers as they progressed into later years.Research limitations/implications -The paper examines a predominantly working-class sample of young people from one urban area of South Wales. Practical implications/implications -On the basis of the data analysis in this paper a number of suggestions are made regarding the nature of future school provision of SRE. Originality/value -This paper raises awareness and highlights issues surrounding the role of schools, teachers and school nurses in sex and relationships education.

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Vending machines contribute to growing levels of obesity. They typically contain energy dense, high fat snacks and attempts at persuading consumers to switch to healthier snacks sold within the same machine have had limited success. This study explored the health benefits and cost effectiveness of the complete replacement of regular snacks with healthy items. Two vending machines were manipulated in a 6-month trial, with a healthy and regular range of products alternated between the two machines every fortnight. Healthy vending resulted in a 61% drop in calories sold relative to regular vending, significant with time and product range as random factors. There was no evidence of compensatory behaviour from nearby shop sales nor in multi-item purchases from vending machines. The impact on profit was less clear. Sales dropped by 30% during healthy vending but variability across product range meant that the change was not significant. Overall our results demonstrate that complete healthy vending can be introduced in hospitals without a catastrophic loss in sales nor compensatory behaviours that offset the public health gains of consuming healthier products.

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