Teen birth rates strike ancestral low in U.S.


Teen birth rates seem to have reached ancestral lows.

A new investigate from researchers during a government’s National Center for Health Statistics shows a U.S. teen birth rate has continued a new declines to strike a record low of 31.3 births per 1,000 women in 2011.

That’s good news, deliberation teen pregnancy could boost health risks for both mom and baby. Teens who are profound are some-more expected to knowledge complications like pregnancy-induced hypertension, anemia, preeclampsia and beforehand birth.

Play Video

16 and Pregnant: One teen’s story

Babies innate to teenagers are adult to 6 times some-more expected to have a low birth weight than infants innate to moms over 20, according to a National Institutes of Health. Pediatrician Dr. Ellen Rome, conduct of a Center for Adolescent Medicine during a Cleveland Clinic, adds that one of a biggest risks is that teen moms are reduction expected to rivet in correct prenatal caring and some-more expected to have bad nutrition, intimately transmitted diseases or piece abuse issues that can risk a pregnancy. Poor prenatal care, such as by not holding a multivitamin with folic acid, could also boost risk for birth defects like spina bifida, she added.

The new investigate also found declines in a series of beforehand births and newborns innate low birth-weights. Premature births fell for a fifth true year from 12.8 percent of all births in 2006 to 11.72 percent of births in 2011. Low birth-weight rates somewhat declined from 8.15 percent of births in 2010 to 8.10 in 2011, that Rome, who was not concerned in a research, explained corresponds with some-more teenagers loitering pregnancy.

Teen pregnancy rates have been disappearing for years. In April, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report showed an all-time low for teen birth rates in 2010 during 34.4 births per each 1,000 women between 15 and 19 years old. That reflected a 44 percent dump in teen birth rates from 1991 to 2010, and there were fewer teenage mothers in 2010 than any year given 1946.

  • U.S. teen pregnancy rates during an all-time low opposite all ethnicities
  • Report: U.S. life outlook lowest among rich nations due to disease, assault
  • Decline in U.S. birth rates slows

What’s behind a descending rates?

Rome thinks a reason is two-fold, in that teenagers are watchful to have sex longer and those who do are regulating some-more effective birth control, such as an intrauterine device (IUD) in further to condoms.

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists expelled new discipline final Sep that speedy doctors to allot hormonal implants or IUDs to teenage girls deliberation contraception as “first-line” methods over a pill, in partial since a tablet needs to be taken daily during a same time to be many potent.

Despite a declines, Rome argued there’s still some-more to be finished to quell teen pregnancy rates, such as by lifting taboos about carrying a sex speak with kids. She recommends children, relatives and a pediatrician start carrying this speak around when a child is 9 to 12 years old. A good time might be when a child is scheduled to accept an HPV vaccine, she added.

Play Video

Opinion: One father’s perspective on teen parenthood

“This gives pediatrician and primogenitor a possibility to have those conversations,” she said, adding, “we can’t forget a teen dads in a equation either.”

Boys are also endorsed to get an HPV vaccine commencement during 11 or 12. Rome pronounced teenagers are some-more expected to make smarter decisions if they have ongoing conversations with their relatives about watchful for sex until a certain time or if they are going to have sex, carrying a review about practicing protected contraception such as by regulating a second process besides condoms.

“If we have sex, afterwards it becomes a choice, not an oops,” she explained.

The news also looked during other trends in U.S. births. The altogether birth rate also declined from 2010 to 2011 to 12.7 births per 1,000 sum women, a lowest rate ever reported for a United States. The commission of births to unwed women also fell somewhat from 40.8 percent of all births in 2010 to 40.7 percent in 2011. Life outlook during birth was dynamic by a researchers to 78.7 years of age in 2011, that was unvaried from a prior year. Unintentional injuries and carnage sojourn a initial and second heading causes of genocide for children underneath 19, accounting for about 47 percent of all fatalities for children and adolescents.

The investigate was published Feb. 11 in Pediatrics.

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • email
  • StumbleUpon
  • Delicious
  • Google Reader
  • LinkedIn
  • BlinkList
  • Digg
  • Google Bookmarks
  • HackerNews
  • Posterous
  • Reddit
  • Sphinn
  • Tumblr
  • Tumblr
  • Tumblr