Sad news today as suicide bombings in Afghanistan claimed the lives of 18 people, including five U.S. servicemen. The tragedy put a spotlight on the embattled region, with over 90,000 U.S. troops stationed there after President Obama’s deployment push last year.

For soldiers deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq, military officials have recently started re-examining their sex policies, with incidents of pregnancy on the rise among female soldiers. Previously, the U.S. military placed a sex ban on deployed troops, calling female soldiers “invaluable,” but now officials are launching a safe sex campaign where sexual relations are “highly discouraged,” but not banned outright between unmarried soldiers of opposite sex.

But, it’s not just heterosexual sex practices that are getting a re-think. Recently, the Pentagon launched a nine-month study on the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. Bans on anal and oral sex will also be reviewed. Some policy makers are criticizing the study, saying that it’s likely to be biased since the Pentagon has already made signals that the barring of gays from the service will soon come to an end. Hopefully it will, because those brave men and women overseas deserve all the help—and sex— they can get.