American Teen Pregnancies Rise for the First Time in 15 Years

The Bush administration yesterday came under attack for diverting funds from sex education to abstinence programs after the first rise in American teenage pregnancy rates in nearly 15 years.

The study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed the rate of births to teenagers rose by 3% last year. About 435,000 babies were born to mothers aged between 15 and 19.

The results were a sharp reversal from 2005, when the rate hit an all-time low of 40.5 births for every 1,000 teenage girls. It was the first such increase since 1991, when teenage pregnancy rates led to an intense educational campaign on contraception, condom use, and the risk of Aids and sexually transmitted disease.

The CDC study gave further weight to arguments by organizations working on reproductive health in America and abroad that the Bush administration was undermining the advances made in the 90s for ideological reasons. Many abstinence programs are run by evangelical organizations.

"The national policy of abstinence-only programs just isn't working," Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, said. "In the last decade more than $1bn has been wasted on abstinence-only programs, when studies show they don't reduce the number of teen pregnancies or sexually transmitted infections."

In his years in the White House Bush has increased funding for programs which try to persuade young people to delay having sex until they are married - and which are barred from dispensing information about contraception. The federal government spends $176m a year on such programs -although recent studies suggest they are ineffective in delaying sexual activity.

The largest rise in the CDC study was among African-American teenagers where the birth rate rose by 5% to 63.7 births for every 1,000 girls. Among whites the birth rate rose by 3% to 26.6% a 1,000. The rate among Latinas rose 2% to 83 births a 1,000. The only reported decline was among Asian teenagers, where the birth rate fell 2% to 16.7 births a 1,000.

Health care advocates say the focus on abstinence programs has left many teenagers vulnerable. According to the Guttmacher Institute, one in three American teenagers receives no education about birth control. However, some health care advocates doubted that the Bush administration's support for abstinence programs was to blame for the rise, noting that studies have shown they had almost no effect on the behavior of teenagers.