An abstinence education advocate says the media is putting a deceptive twist on a new report that shows an encouraging decline in the number of teen pregnancies, births, and abortions.
According to researchers at the Guttmacher Institute, U.S. teen pregnancies have declined dramatically since their peak in the early 1990s, as have the number of births and abortions. Teen pregnancies in 2008 reached their lowest level at a rate of about seven percent -- down 42 percent from the peak of 1990.
Researchers say teens are deciding to be more effective contraceptive users, but Valerie Huber of the National Abstinence Education Association (NAEA) says the way this study is being reported is misleading because it ignores the fact that abstinence education was being taught in one-fourth of public schools during the year these statistics were gathered.
"Contraceptive education and contraceptives in general are being credited … for the reason for these drops, and that's just a disingenuous argument," she says.
The report also shows that 75 percent of 1-5 to 17-year-olds are not even having sex, which, in part, accounts for the decline. But Huber finds another statistic troubling.
"About 75 percent of teens didn't even use contraception the last time they had sex, so to say that these drops are due to contraceptive usage is really stretching the truth," the NAEA executive director adds.
She goes on to report that even though the 2012 federal budget does call for replacing some money for the Sexual Risk Avoidance program (see earlier story), there is still a 50-to-1 disparity between abstinence education and contraceptive education monies.
The Guttmacher Institute was founded in the late 1960s as a semi-autonomous division of The Planned Parenthood Federation of America. It now operates as an independent not-for-profit corporation.
Contact: Bob Kellogg
Source:OneNewsNow
