An article in the Deseret Morning News reports on a CDC study revealing that after fourteen years of steady declines in teen pregnancy rates, rates increased 3% for the first time from 1995 to 1996. The previous high was 61.8 birth per 1,000 girls aged 15 - 19 in 1991. In 1995, there were 40.5 births per 1,000 girls. In 1996, that figure increased to 41.9 birth per 1,000 teenage girls. The rise is not surprising given the catastrophic increase in cases of sexually transmitted diseases like syphilis, gonorrhea, and chlamydia over the past few years.Although the CDC study did not evaluate state-by-state numbers, statistics from the Utah Department of Health suggest that Utah is contributing to the problem. 18 of the 61 monitored regions have teen pregnancy rates higher than the national average. The regions with the highest rates are Rose Park (96.5 birth per 1,000 teenage girls), downtown Ogden (83 birth per 1,000 teenage girls), and Glendale (79.8 births per 1,000 teenage girls).
Missy Larsen, the Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood Action Council agrees that sex education focusing on abstinence-only programs are to blame and that sex education in Utah needs reform. She says, "These kinds of statistics force us to ask ourselves if we are doing the best for our young people to help them prevent unintended pregnancies and to arm themselves against these diseases that could prevent them from ever having children...Kids want to talk about it and they overwhelmingly want to talk about it with parents. If we can have a comprehensive approach with abstinence as the foundation and provide medically reliable information about contraception we would be doing the most we can to keep teens healthy."
What are your opinions on sex education? Is an abstinence-only approach responsible for the increased in teen pregnancy nation-wide? Should Utah's sex ed programs be reformed?
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