Teen pregnancy at historic low

The rate of teenage pregnancy in the United States is at a historic low, and has dropped by more than half in the last two decades, declining across nearly all racial and ethnic groups, according to a government report released on Friday, reports Reuters

“The rate for girls ages 15-19 dropped to 29.4 births per 1,000 last year from 31.3 per 1,000 in 2011. This was less than half the 61.8 births per 1,000 teenage girls recorded in 1991.

“That is an astonishing success in terms of this particular topic of debate,” said Brady Hamilton, a statistician with the National Center for Health Statistics who led the data collection. The Center is part of the U.S. government’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“The numbers have steadily declined over the last two decades, except for a brief spike in 2006 and 2007, Hamilton said. Among racial and ethnic groups, the largest decline since 2007 was reported for Hispanic teenagers, for whom the rate dropped 39 percent to 46.3 births per 1,000 to 2012 from 2007. Last year, the rate of births for white, Black, Hispanic and Asian or Pacific Islander teenagers declined from 5 to 7 percent compared to 2011. Bill Albert, a spokesman for the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, said it was impossible to predict if the drop in teenage mothers will continue, so it is important for parents and policymakers not to mistake progress for absolute victory.

“Obviously they are making better decisions, having less sex and using more contraception,” he said. The Obama administration has invested in efforts aimed at lowering the rate of teenage pregnancies. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services gave $155 million in teenage pregnancy prevention grants to states, school districts and non-profit organizations.”

 

More at: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/07/us-usa-health-teenbirths-idUSBRE98602K20130907?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews

Teen e-cigarette sales skyrocket

The share of middle and high school students who use e-cigarettes doubled in 2012 from the previous year, federal data show, according to the New York Times.images-1

“The rise is prompting concerns among health officials that the new devices could be creating as many health problems as they are solving.

“One in 10 high school students said they had tried an e-cigarette last year, according to a national survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, up from one in 20 in 2011. About 3 percent said they had used one in the last 30 days. In total, 1.8 million middle and high school students said they had tried e-cigarettes in 2012.

“This is really taking off among kids,” said Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the C.D.C. E-cigarettes are battery-powered devices that deliver nicotine that is vaporized to form an aerosol mist. Producers promote them as a healthy alternative to smoking, but researchers say their health effects are not yet clear, though most acknowledge that they are less harmful than traditional cigarettes. The Food and Drug Administration does not yet regulate them, though analysts expect that the agency will start soon.

“Thomas Briant, executive director of the National Association of Tobacco Outlets, which represents 28,000 stores, said the study “raises too many unanswered questions,” for the data to be used for policy making. It was unclear, for example, whether students who tried e-cigarettes were using them regularly or only once. He pointed out that selling them to minors is now illegal in many states.

“One of the biggest concerns among health officials is the potential for e-cigarettes to become a path to smoking among young people who otherwise would not have experimented. The survey found that most students who had tried e-cigarettes had also smoked traditional cigarettes. Continue reading “Teen e-cigarette sales skyrocket”

Apple stops using teen labor in China

imgres-2Apple said a Chinese labor agent forged documents on behalf of underage workers as the world’s most-valuable technology company seeks to improve conditions at suppliers making iPhones, iPads and Macs. Bloomberg News reports that

“The electronics company also stopped doing business with a manufacturer that employed 74 people younger than 16 who used the faked papers, according to its annual Supplier Responsibility Report released today. The recruiter was reported to provincial authorities, fined and had its license suspended. ‘Underage labor is a subject no company wants to be associated with, so as a result I don’t believe it gets the attention it deserves, and as a result it doesn’t get fixed like it should,’ Jeff Williams, Cupertino, California-based Apple’s senior vice president of operations, said in an interview. Continue reading “Apple stops using teen labor in China”