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  • Title: Teenage pregnancy and childbearing: why the difference between countries?
    Journal: Fam Plann Perspect; 1983; 15(3):104. PubMed ID: 6873254.
    Abstract:
    Early teenage childbearing is higher in the U.S. than in any of 30 developed countries studied except for Hungary and Romania. The very high birthrate of young adolescent blacks--about 3 times that of comparable whites--does not explain the difference. The fertility of whites aged 17 and younger is still higher than that of young teenagers in any of the other countries except for the 2 already noted and for Greece and Iceland. Also the abortion rate for both older and younger teenagers is highest in the U.S. Thus pregnancy rates among American adolescents exceed those among teenagers in other developed countries, except Hungary. While adolescent childbearing has been declining in the U.S., teenage pregnancy rates are continuing to rise, unlike those in other developed countries. The level of adolescent sexual activity in the U.S. does not appear to be higher than those in England, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark, where adolescent fertility and abortion rates are very much lower than they are in the U.S. The suggestion that the welfare system in the U.S. encourages teenage childbearing does not explain the lower fertility rates of European countries which offer greater financial benefits for both younger and older parents. The author of a recent study of teenage pregnancy in Sweden believes that the sharp decline in adolescent fertility there may be the result of a close partnership between schools and family planning services and easy access to contraceptive services, among other factors mentioned. A recent analysis of interstate variations in adolescent fertility within the U.S. found that residence in a southern state was the most important predictor of high adolescent fertility.
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