There is interesting piece about teen pregnancy from the Centers for Disease Control on Yahoo News, and it does have some good news: teen births are at their lowest level in more than
60 years. The CDC reported that the U.S. teen birth rate
dropped 9% from 2009 to 2010, reaching a historic low of 34.3
births per 1,000 teens aged 15 to 19. This is 43% below their peak in
1970. It attributed the drop to several
factors, including strong pregnancy-prevention messages aimed at teens
and increased use of contraception. But the geographic variation is substantial.
Teen birthrates are highest in Texas, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Arkansas, and New Mexico,. There are slightly lower concentrations in the neighboring states of Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Arizona. On the other end of the equation, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, and Massachusetts have the lowest rates of teen births.
