Monday, May 21, 2007

Colorado Teen Pregnancy Crisis

"I guess I thought it couldn't happen to me." Most mom's who don't expect to get pregnant say this after the fact.

For several years now, my wife and I have watched the struggles of a neighbor girl who got pregnant. To her and her family's credit, she had the child. But she is really struggling with all of it as a 17 year plus teenager whose a mom. Its not to say that being a 17 year old mom is wrong but its an uphill battle in today's culture to have a child at this young age.

Colorado is gripped by a growing unintended pregnancy crisis. Read the entire story here.
Here are some numbers for you from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment:
*40 percent of all births in Colorado are unintended!

*75 percent of teen births in Colorado were unintended!

*25 percent decline in teen pregnancies in the past decade. 14 percent of the decline attributable to teens having less sex.

Assumably, other factors contributed to the overall decline such as abstinence education. No matter how you slice it, our culture has little sense of cause and effect. Meaning this: if you have sex you may get pregnant.

I don't think that these trends should surprise us. Our young people live in a sex-whenever culture and many have the false impression that everyone is "doing it." If given a chance, most kids want to reserve their sexuality and not discard it cheaply. Anything other than abstinence poses high risks of disease or unintended pregnancies.

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