2014 San Francisco Pregnancy Symposium – Teen Pregnancy Facts

 

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Teen pregnancy is a devastating condition, but tables are slowly turning. During the 2014 San Francisco Pregnancy Symposium, essential facts were discussed especially the decline of teen birth rate, which is excellent news. Take, for instance, Chicago; the teen birth rate has fallen to a massive “historical law.” The city’s teen birth rate fell a considerable margin of 47% in the last five years (2011-2016), the biggest downfall was seen among African-Americans. From the most recent year that data was collected, (2016), there were 24.6 births per 1,000 females from the age 0f 15 to 19, it decreased from 46.5 five years ago. In the entire state, its teen birth rate fell from 29.5 to 18.7. It shows that Americans of all ages have fewer children now compared to before. The downfall was caused by teens having less sex. They use more effective contraceptives, and teens are well educated now because of informative sex education programs. This fact is according to the study by Pew Research Center. This downfall has a massive outcome to Chicago’s future because it means more Chicago teens can continue and focus on their education, work, achieving their goals in life and to creating a better future for themselves. Through the effort in Chicago to educate teens, they have programs like sexual health education, sexually transmitted infection testing and treatment in schools, colleges and community organizations they reach, to reduce their teen births, because their program focuses on birth control.

Source: pixabay.com

Even with progress across racial groups during the last five years, differences persist in Chicago. Among African-Americans the rate was 32 per 1000, and among Hispanics have 28.4 per 1000, and white teens have 5.1 births per 1000, the discrepancy was far below the national rate of 14.3, these data were from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Chicago’s economic classes also had a rapid downfall of teen birth rate, even the teens who are on the financial hardship like poverty, income, unemployment, and education has the rate of 7.5 compared with the rate of 34.4 among the city’s most disadvantaged teens. Chicago’s advocacy is to help the youth to grow into a healthy adult with work and better future, that will also help them have a prosperous and well-educated state.