www.roanoke.com

Linda Whitlock

Recent columns

• Seeing racism where it's not
• Sanford could still be a hero
• Skeptics or traitors?
• School freedom is elusive

From the RoundTable blog

Americans, David Nova tells us, fixate on the Roe v. Wade anniversary because our "ambivalence to sexuality and birth control results in too many abortions" ("End abortion: Prevent unintended pregnancies," Jan. 22 commentary).

This ambivalence, according to Nova, has led to "ineffective policies designed to prohibit sex and abortion" in place of those that "prevent unintended pregnancy and unprotected sex."

"No wonder," Nova says, "that teen pregnancy rates are on the rise once more."

Problem is, teen pregnancy rates aren't on the rise. At least not in the nation as a whole.

It's the teen birth rate, not the pregnancy rate, that rose by 3 percent from 2005 to 2006. The two aren't one and the same, though Nova uses the terms interchangeably in his commentary.

A National Center for Health Statistics info sheet posted October 2008 indicates that increase was a blip in an otherwise sharp drop in teen pregnancy, birth and abortion rates from 1990 to 2004.

During that time, according to the NCHS, the pregnancy rate for teens ages 15-19 fell 38 percent, from 116.8 per 1,000 to 72.2.

Teen birth rates also dropped to 40.5 per 1,000 in 2005 from a high of 61.8 in 1991. From 2005 to 2006, the rate ticked back up to 41.9 per 1,000.

Roanoke city's teen pregnancy and birth rates also increased from 2005 to 2006 and again in 2007. But at 71.1 and 44.6 per 1,000, respectively, they're in line with the most recent national rates.

They do, however, exceed Mississippi's rates, as Nova says, though Nova seems to be comparing Mississippi's 2006 birth rate for teens 15-19 years of age to Roanoke city's 2007 pregnancy rate for all teens.

Nova contends that states like Mississippi that offer abstinence-based sex education have higher rates of teen pregnancies than states with comprehensive programs.

That may be. And Mississippi's teen pregnancy and birth rates did increase from 2006 to 2007. Still, the state's Department of Health statistics show Mississippi's overall rates to be lower than those cited on the NCHS fact sheet.

Whether or not abstinence-based sex education programs account for Mississippi's increase in teen pregnancies, they can't be blamed for Roanoke's increase. Neither can ignorance.

If Roanoke schools follow the Family Life Education curriculum posted online, by the end of eighth grade, kids ought to know pretty much all they need to about preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.

High teen pregnancy rates, like most social problems, can't be traced to a single cause. The sex-saturated media are no doubt one factor. Another is American ambivalence toward -- not sexuality and birth control, as Nova claims -- but making moral judgments.

With our misguided definitions of tolerance and compassion, no one wants to tell young girls that having babies before marriage is not just difficult and unwise but morally wrong.

A little more social disapproval aimed at both males and females involved not only in teen pregnancies but also in the "unmarried with children" phenomena in general might go a surprising way toward curbing teens' urge to engage in baby-making behavior.

While social disapproval may not completely solve the teen pregnancy problem, it does have the virtue, in these lean economic times, of costing nothing.

Planned Parenthood, on the other hand, wants taxpayer money to fund a community health educator.

Given the curriculum Roanoke city already has in place, more education isn't likely to reduce Roanoke's teen pregnancy rate. When it comes to teens and sex, knowing what to do doesn't equate to doing it.

But even if more education were the answer, a state that has no money for abstinence programs surely has no money for Planned Parenthood's programs either. Besides, Planned Parenthood is a nonprofit organization that makes a profit, so let it provide its own funding.

Planned Parenthood is welcome to do whatever it wants with its own money. But as an organization that provides abortions, it isn't welcome to do whatever it wants with mine.

Whitlock, a Roanoke Times columnist, is an adjunct English professor who lives in Salem.