Should Teens Have Access Of Birth Control Without Parents?

In truth, contraceptive access will not increase the rates of teen sex, according to a 2017 paper co-authored by five John Hopkins doctors and pediatricians (Gebelhoff 7). The pamphlet used to help teens decide if they are ready should be viewed as a good thing because it gives students reasons not to proceed (Culp-Ressler 4). Additionally, John Hopkins says, teenagers on the pill or other hormonal birth control options are more likely to be protected from pregnancy than those who use condoms because the pill has a lower rate of failure and is not influenced by pressures in the moment (Gebelhoff 8). Hormonal birth control is more effective at preventing pregnancy, but it would be impossible for most teen girls with reluctant parents to obtain if states require parental permission due to the scarcity of clinics and lack of over the counter

Teens should be allowed to purchase birth control without parental consent because many parents agree that their child is mature to make the decision on their own. The author of “Contrceptive should be available to teens without parental consent claims that birth control is a freedom of fundamental human rights.” If teens are making the decision to have sex without parental consent birth control should be the same when it comes to protecting themselves against pregnancy and other life changing decisions. Furthermore, many teens are not open when it comes to talking to their parents about sex not to mention birth control. Birth control should be attained without parental consent unless the individual decides if her parents should be involved.

A 16-year-old girl visits a birth control clinic and asks to be put on the pill. Since she is a minor, the clinic doctor who writes the prescription for her notifies her parents of the action. As of the year 2016, there are only 26 states that allow minors to obtain contraceptives without parental consent. There are 20 states that allow certain minors to obtain contraceptives without parental consent and those include minors that are married or who have already been pregnant. Four states have no laws on parental consent (Gutimacher Institute, 2016). This ethical controversy leaves room for an open interruption of whether or not minors should need parental consent to gain access to birth control, to apply ethical reasoning to this controversy one must examine the ethical principles of utilitarianism, rights-based, duty-based, justice based, and virtue-based ethics.

In our society today, the topic of birth control and other contraceptives for teens is a stirring debate. Teens are more promiscuous and sexually active than ever before; as early as middle school, we are seeing more teenage pregnancies, STD’s, and abortions than ever. Teenagers are not comfortable discussing their sexual activity with their parents and as a result they are seeking out other ways to gain access to birth control and other forms of contraceptives without parental consent. Access to birth control reduces the number of unintended teenage pregnancies and abortions each year, and access to birth control also fuels teenage promiscuity and encourages sex outside of marriage.

Sexually active teens that don’t use birth control have a 90% chance of getting pregnant within a year (Guttmacher Institute). Most teens refuse to use birth control for their own personal reasons. Teens use birth control to opt out of having protected sex” (Center for reproductive Rights 80). There is a high percentage rate of teens that actually use condoms during sex. 74% of females used contraception the first time they had sex (Guttmacher Institute). The percentage of teens that used more than one form of contraception is very low. Approximately 25% of sexually active teens use 2 methods of birth control during sex (Guttmacher Institute). The rate of teens that use condoms and still get pregnant is very low. During the first year of “typical use”, 20 of teens under the age of 18 using condoms for contraception get pregnant within one year (Abstinence Programs 75). It proves that abstinence programs reach teens that are not easily influenced by sex.

Teenagers should have access to birth control devices. The most compelling argument against this thesis is the idea that they are not emotionally mature enough to be having sex at all, in that it is a meaningful commitment that should be only taken up by adults who have the ability to consent fully and understand the consequences of their behavior. Additionally, sexual behavior contains a lot of risks of many different natures. There is the emotional risk of engaging in such intimate activity, with concomitant development of feelings that may not be reciprocated or healthy. There is also the physical risk of disease. For heterosexual women, pregnancy is an emotional, physical, and economic strain that could severely derail a promising

-Thesis Statement- Teenagers should not be required to have permission from their parents to receive birth control.

While some speakers on the issue argue their side with the perspective of the students and teens in mind others focus on the parents and how their perspectives relate to the issue. Helium.com presently has a poll and debate occurring that allows the public to review multiple arguments from both sides of the debate, and then vote “Yes” or “No” on the issue of teens receiving birth control at school. Jeannie Kerns, a mother of seven children, says that it’s in the best interest of the teen, and their parents, to allow them to have the option to decide for themselves if they require “the pill”. She supports her argument by informing the reader, no matter how strongly parents push for their children to abstain from sex they’ll most likely engage in it anyway. She closes her argument by asking why parents wouldn’t

Seven hundred fifty thousand teenagers, ages fifteen to nineteen, become pregnant each year (“Facts”). Teenage birth specialists have often debated whether or not teenagers should have access to birth control and other contraceptives. Although some people think teenagers having birth control will promote promiscuity, birth control should be accessible to teens because they will put themselves at a higher risk for disease and pregnancy without it, and more teenage girls would get a high school diploma with it.

Teenagers are still growing and learning. Sometimes we forget that they are making choices that can affect their whole life. Yes, we are here to teach them and to guide them in making decisions that will help shape their future. Are they going to make mistakes? Are they going to regret some of their choices? Are they going to wish that they had listened to their parents at times that they didn’t? I’m pretty sure that we made mistakes as teenagers and decisions that we wish we could change. I know that some made worse choices than others but, we have all made poor choices at one time or another even as adults. I definitely feel that

While parents would like their children to wait as long as possible to begin having sex, the reality is that teens are having sex much younger than many parents think. Some teens, or preteens, begin having sex or engaging in sexual behavior in junior high. By the time they are seniors in high school, an estimated 65 percent of teens have had sex, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey, 2007. (Dawn, 2009). Unfortunately, a percentage of those teens will become pregnant. After more than a decade and a half of decline (a 27 percent drop from 1991 to 2000), teen birth rates rose again in 2006, which was the last year for which data are available. It is still unclear on what caused teen birth rates to rise again, with supporters of abstinence-only sex education programs and contraception-based programs each blaming the other side for the increase. However, a 2007 study in the Journal of American Public Health attributed the trend in decreasing pregnancy rates to improved contraception use among teens during that time. (Anderson Orr, 2009).

Statistics from recent studies suggest that only 13% of U.S. teens have ever had sex by the age of 15. But by the age of 19, seven in ten teens of both sexes have had sex. Between 1995 and 2006-2008, the percentage of teens aged 15-17 who had ever engaged in sexual intercourse declined from 38% to 28%. Among teens aged 18-19, it declined from 68% in 1995 to 60% in 2006-2008. The pregnancy rate among young women has declined steadily from 117 pregnancies per 1,000 women aged 15-19 in 1990 to 70 per 1,000 in 2005. However in 2006, the rate increased for the first time in more than a decade, rising to

"Over one million teenage girls become pregnant each year. In the next 24 hours, about 3,312 girls will become pregnant. In addition, 43% of all adolescents become pregnant before the age of 20. These are incredible statistics when you consider that there are only 31 million females. The United States has the highest adolescent pregnancy rate in the developed world. As statistics show one in nine women between the ages of 15 through 19 become pregnant each year. Also, every 26 seconds a teenage girl becomes pregnant and every 56 seconds a child of a teenage mother is born."

"Teen pregnancy in the United States: In 2015, a total of 229,715 babies were born to women aged 15-19 years old, for a birth rate of 22.3 per 1,000 women in this age group. This is another record for U.S. teens and a drop of 8% from 2014. Although reasons for the declines are not totally clear, evidence suggests these declines are due to more teens abstaining from sexual activity, and more teens who are sexually active using birth control than in previous years. Still, the U.S. teen pregnancy rate is substantially higher than in other western industrialized nations, and racial/ethnic and geographic disparities in teen birth rates persist (cdc.gov)." As teenagers (in the United States), we are peer pressured or tempted to try new things. Some teens tend to try out drugs, and alcohol. However, some are having unprotected sex in which, is leads to having babies. This is called, teenage pregnancy. This has caused the United States to create records based off of the statistics and facts given from, researchers across the United States. In order to help prevent teenage pregnancy in the United States, teenagers must understand why, having a baby now isn’t such a smart move on their part.

The teen pregnancy rate had decreased by the maximum of about 55 percent. Most teen birth rates had also gone down about 64 percent, but yet teen pregnancies and birth rate for teenagers ages 15-19 in the U.S still remains one of the highest comparable countries. Due to parenthood, most of teen moms drop out of school. More than 50% of teen mothers never graduate to get their diploma. Sexually active teens that don’t use any type of protection has a 90 percent chance of becoming pregnant within a year, 84 percent of teen pregnancies are unplanned.