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Pregnancy and Childbirth Among Females Aged 10–19 Years — United States, 2007–2010

	Supplement Volume 62, Supplement, No. 3 November 22, 2013 PDF of this issue

Pregnancy and Childbirth Among Females Aged 10–19 Years — United States, 2007–2010

Supplements

November 22, 2013 / 62(03);71-76

Stephanie J. Ventura, MA

Brady E. Hamilton, PhD

T.J. Mathews, MS

National Center for Health Statistics, CDC

Corresponding author: Stephanie J. Ventura, Division of Vital Statistics, National Center for Health Statistics, CDC. Telephone: 301-458-4547; E-mail: sventura@cdc.gov.

Introduction

Pregnancy and childbirth among females aged < 20 years have been the subject of long-standing concern among the public, the public health community, and policy makers (1–3). Teenagers who give birth are much more likely than older women to deliver a low birthweight or preterm infant, and their babies are at higher risk for dying in infancy (4–6). The annual public costs associated with births among teenage girls are an estimated $10.9 billion (7). According to the 2006–2010 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), an estimated 77% of births to teenagers aged 15–19 years were unintended (8).
The 2010 U.S. birth rate among females aged 15–19 was 34.2 births per 1,000. This is a 10% decrease from 2009 (37.9) and an 18% decrease from 2007 (41.5) (9). A long-term decrease that began in 1991 was continuous except for a brief increase during 2005–2007; the birth rate among females aged 15–19 years decreased by 45% from 1991 (61.8 per 1,000) to 2010 (9,10). An analysis found that if the 1991 birth rates for females aged 15–19 years had remained the same during 1992–2010, an additional 3.4 million births would have occurred among women aged 15–19 years in the United States (11). Significant decreases in birth rates for females aged 15–19 years occurred among all race and Hispanic ethnicity groups from 2007 to 2010, including non-Hispanic whites, non-Hispanic blacks, American Indian/Alaska Natives (AI/ANs), Asians or Pacific Islanders (A/PIs), and Hispanics. Rates also decreased for certain Hispanic groups, including those of Mexican and Puerto Rican origin. Despite the widespread decreases, disparities persist (9,11), and the U.S. birth rate for females aged 15–19 years remains one of the highest among industrialized countries (12).
This report is part of the second CDC Health Disparities and Inequalities Report (CHDIR) and updates information presented in the first CHDIR (13). The 2011 CHDIR (14) was the first CDC report to assess disparities across a wide range of diseases, behavioral risk factors, environmental exposures, social determinants, and health-care access. The topics presented in this report are based on criteria that are described in the 2013 CHDIR Introduction (15). The purposes of this pregnancy and childbirth analysis and discussion are to highlight and raise awareness of differences in the characteristics of females aged < 20 years (including 10–14, 15–19, 15–17, and 18–19 years) who become pregnant and give birth and to prompt actions to reduce these disparities.