Pregnancy Rates Increase Among Younger Local Teens

Pregnancies are on the rise among Spokane County girls from 15 to 17 years old, but fewer older teenagers are getting pregnant.

Of girls who do become pregnant, far fewer are having abortions than in the past.

“More kids are choosing to keep their children,” said Melinda Harmon, the state’s teen pregnancy prevention coordinator.

One in 21 Spokane County teens 15 to 17 years old became pregnant in 1988. That rose to one in 18 in 1993, according to the state Health Department’s latest statistics.

Among 18- and 19-year-old girls, one in seven got pregnant in 1988, compared with one in eight in 1993.

In a striking change, nearly half of pregnant Spokane County teens 15 and older had abortions in 1988, compared with just more than a third in 1993.

That meant 403 abortions in 1993 and 522 five years earlier.

The abortion trend holds true throughout the state and country, say health officials, who offer a variety of theories to explain it.

“It’s more accepted to have and keep your baby, so less and less teens are choosing to abort,” said Lyndia Vold, a program coordinator at the Spokane County Health District.

“I really think there’s some value shift in younger people. There’s more value on the human life,” said P.J. Watters, who serves on the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Coalition.

“They’re saying things like, ‘I got myself into this, so I’m going to be responsible.”’

Others attribute some of the drop in abortions to pro-life activism and a nationwide decline in abortion clinics and doctors.

The issue is so politically sticky, state health officials don’t even want to speculate on the reasons behind the decline, said Harmon. However, an analysis of the statistics is planned.

Statewide, nearly 9,000 teens had abortions in 1978, compared with 5,600 in 1993.

The rise in pregnancies among young Spokane County teens is unusual for a county that traditionally has had one of the state’s lowest teen pregnancy rates.

Statewide, teen pregnancy rates have stabilized during the past decade. About one in 11 teens 15 and older became pregnant in 1993 - the same as in 1983.

The jump in young teen pregnancies in Spokane County should spur parents and the community to action, Watters said.

“I think we need to have a whole lot more conversation about it in families. We don’t have as much conversation or access (to information on pregnancy and birth control) until after they graduate from high school. There’s still taboos about talking about it until they’re out of high school.”

Pregnancies among younger teens may be rising because girls are maturing sexually at a younger age, said Sandra Meicher, executive director at Planned Parenthood.

“You have a group of younger teens who are physically able to have children at a younger age,” Meicher said. “The community needs to work on that age group.”

Kids aren’t getting enough guidance from their parents, said Vold.

“We’re not setting limits for our kids. They’re left alone a lot more now than they used to be.”

In 1992, the county’s pregnancy rate for teens 15 to 17 ranked 27th out of 39 Washington counties. In just one year, it had jumped to 16th-highest in the state.

Vold said health workers hope it’s an aberration rather than a trend. Still, she said, about half of teenagers in Spokane County say they’re sexually active.

“The sophistication of our kids is increasing, but we’re not keeping up with them,” she said.

“We’re just being ignorant if we think our kids aren’t reproductive, sexual beings.”