Teenage Pregnancy-Social Policy

The first 200 words of this essay...

While rates of teen pregnancy are falling across Europe, the number of teen mothers in Britain rose 7.5% between 1994 and 1996. Young girls in Britain are twice as likely to get pregnant as girls in Germany, four times more likely than girls in France and seven times more likely than teens in the Netherlands (BBC News, 1999).

The government is clearly aware that the trend not only causes social disruption but increases the pressure on welfare services it is desperately trying to reduce. The government's social exclusion unit, has released a controversial report about how to tackle the problem. It is controversial because, although everyone agrees that the rising number of teen pregnancies is a tragedy, there is widespread disagreement about how to prevent it. Sex education campaigners are firmly divided into two camps. Traditional groups like Family Youth Concern argue that teaching children to wait the only way.

"The government's current policy is to tell kids about contraception but that's obviously failed," said spokeswoman Valerie Riches. "Young people need to know the truth. From a health, personal and social welfare point of view, they should put off sex."

Other groups, such as the