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What Is It?
The teen pregnancy rate is an estimate of the proportion of women aged 15-19 who had a live birth, induced abortion, or miscarriage during a given year. Teen mothers are more likely than adult mothers to be high school dropouts, be unemployed, and lack parenting skills. In addition to increased lifetime risk of social and economic disadvantage to both the teens and their children, there are many health risks to the infants. These include increased risk of low birth weight, pre-term delivery, fetal distress, and other adverse outcomes.
How are Dickinson and Iron Counties doing?
In the Dickinson-Iron Health District, there were 63 births to teens in 2000 (a rate of 56.6), 52 births to teens in 1999 (rate of 46.7), 61 births to teens in 1998 (rate of 54.2).
There were an estimated 22,404 pregnancies among Michigan teenagers in 2000, resulting in a rate of 66 per 1,000 females age 15-19 years old. Teen pregnancy rates have declined almost 27 percent since 1990 when the rate peaked at 98.5.
Click on the map below to show the County specific rates.
How do Dickinson and Iron Counties compare with Michigan and the U.S.?
The below three-year average teen pregnancy rate chart shows that Dickinson-Iron District Health Department teen pregnancy rates are significantly lower than both state and national rates. The Dickinson- Iron rate is approaching the year 2010 Goals for the nation
Pregnancy rates for ages 15-17 are lower than for those ages 18-19, and both rates have been declining in recent years state-wide. Pregnancy rates for ages 15-17 decreased from 61.9 in 1990 to 40.8 in 1998. For those aged 18-19, pregnancy rates have decreased from 148.1 in 1990 to 116.5 in 1998.
What other information is important to know?
Few teens who become pregnant intend to do so. Estimates from a 1996 Michigan Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS) survey indicate that about 84.3 percent of births to teens were unintended. Factors that may contribute to teen pregnancies include lack of health and sex education, alcohol or drug use, history of sexual abuse, low socioeconomic status, lack of or inconsistent birth control practices, poor academic performance, low self-esteem, and low self-determination.
What are the Dickinson-Iron District Health Department and the Michigan Department of Community Health doing to affect this indicator?
The Dickinson-Iron District Health Department is actively working to prevent teen pregnancies through the efforts of the Michigan Abstinence Partnership (MAP). Family planning providers, through contracts with the Michigan Department of Community Health, offer contraceptives and reproductive health services to encourage fertility control. The strong educational and counseling components of the programs help to reduce health risks and promote healthy behaviors. These services include encouraging abstinence and parental involvement as appropriate for sexually-active teens
The MAP, developed by the Michigan Department of Community Health in 1993, is a broad-based group of people from across the state committed to encouraging young people to stay healthy by avoiding risky behaviors such as sexual activity. The partnership funds state and local abstinence activities targeted to youth and families in their communities. The group aims to positively impact adolescent health problems by promoting abstinence from sexual activity among the 9 to 14 year-old population. The partnership has had a successful, award-winning media campaign to educate both children and their parents. Using the theme "Sex Can Wait," children are educated about the consequences of sexual activity and parents are encouraged to talk with their children about these important issues. Additional program components include funding for local coalition activity, parent groups, and program evaluation. In 1998, approximately 160,000 youths, (state-wide) 9 to 14 years old, and their parents participated in local coalition-driven activities, educational programs, and media campaigns.
The Dickinson-Iron District Health Department through a MAP grant has been the co-coordinator of the Dickinson-Iron Healthy Youth Coalition. This group focuses on Youth Developmental Asset Building protocol to promote Healthy lifestyles for all youth which includes abstinence from pre-marital sexual intercourse
The Dickinson and Iron Interagency Coordinating Council Early On Program has added "at risk" children to the criteria for services by Early On. All infants of teen parents are considered "at risk" so that these children may be enrolled in Early On and the family can receive comprehensive services. These services include efforts to prevent subsequent untimely pregnancies among these young parents and the development of teen parent support groups at area high schools. The focus of these teen groups is high school completion, as well as quality parenting. The 0-3 IMPETUS program also targets Maternal and Infant Support services to at-risk teen mothers to assist in preventing a second unplanned pregnancy. The Health Department continues to offer both MSS and ISS programs. One of the main goals of these programs is to help the teens prevent a second untimely pregnancy. The newly awarded 0-5 Parent in Education grant will allow public health services for all parents regardless of at-risk status and will include additional electronic materials to promote abstinence
There has been a trend over the past few years for more of the young parents to release babies for open adoption. Most of the mothers choosing to release are no longer teens, although they were teens with their first (and often second) births. Efforts through interagency collaboration (including Early On) continue to change attitudes regarding adoption and promote adoption to teen women as a very positive choice.
Another approach that is being used among agency staff is to not celebrate the birth of the baby to a teen, but to celebrate the teen's high school completion. Easier access to family planning services also helps to prevent unintended pregnancy. There are many teens, however, who have admitted that the pregnancy was actually planned and wanted, as unrealistic as that may be.
The Dickinson and Iron Collaborative Boards continue to monitor these teen pregnancy statistics and support assisting programs.