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THE NUMBER OF teenage pregnancies has fallen by 64% in 15 years, new statistics have shown.
The HSE said that new birth figures released by the CSO today show a decrease in the number of births to teenagers from 3,087 in 2001 to 1,098 in 2016.
This equates to a decrease in the teen birth rate from 20 per 1000 of women aged 15-19 in population in Ireland in 2001 to 7.8 per 1000 of in 2016.
Orla McGowan of the HSE’s Sexual Health and Crisis Pregnancy Programme said: “The Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) programme in schools and in youth centres plays a crucial role in informing teenagers about healthy relationships and the potential consequences of early sex.
“The teenage birth rate has gradually declined since the introduction of the programme. Previous research has found that those who received RSE were more likely to use contraception at first sex which suggests that RSE in schools and youth centres has made a significant contribution to the decline.”
While the number of pregnancies are down, sexually transmitted infections (STIs) are on the rise among young Irish people.
STIs on the rise
The Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) records show that in 2016, there were 990 cases of teenagers (15-19) diagnosed with either chlamydia (608 cases) gonorrhoea (209) or genital herpes (173 cases) This represents a 8.3 % increase in STIs in teenagers in 2016 when compared to 2015 figures.
The Growing Up in Ireland survey also revealed of 17 and 18-year-olds found that one third of young people reported they had previously had sexual intercourse. Other studies with teenagers, such as the Health Behaviour in School Aged Children, 2014 have found similar proportions of sexual activity.
Of those who were sexually active, 79% reported that they always used some form of contraception. According to the HSE, “this shows that the majority of sexually active teenagers are aware of the risk of pregnancy and use contraception to protect themselves”.
McGowan added that while this relatively high rate of contraceptive use is encouraging, condom use is much lower among the group, with only 56% reporting that they always used one.
She said:
This suggests that four in ten sexually active teenagers are not using a condom every time they have sex, which puts them at risk of contracting an STI. What is particularly worrying is that more than one in ten sexually active teenagers reported that they never used a condom when having sex.
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I would say the difference in sti cases is more to do with more teens opting to go get checked
@Shannon Cassidy: get checked or just relying on the pill.
@Shawn O’Ceallaghan: you have a point but education is key here. Great to see the drop in unwanted pregnancies, that’s what we all want, but no so great is the lack of publicity of young women forced into being parents. Also we need to concentrate on STIs and the huge damage they do to both boys and girls.
@Deborah Behan: a lot of lads forced into being fathers too
@gjpb: absolutely agree but how many stand by their off spring for life? No one should be forced to be a parent.
@Deborah Behan: I do think the vast majority of lads stand by their children if the mother wants him involved.
I think where lads don’t stand by the children is when the mother’s don’t want them to be involved.
As it stands right now if a woman has to be a parent I think the man should be too
I love sitting outside of Irish society and watching the holy Mary brigade die off one by one. Maternity ward for baby sellers? I think not. Article 8 for ever? I think not. I guess they really knew what was at stake in 2015 with the SSMref. The flood gates of a populace thinking for itself were pushed open a chink and the pressure had been building for many years. I’m savouring the birth of this new Ireland.
@Ian Phillip Creaner: there is still a long way to go but the true nature of the institution of the Roman Catholic Church is being revealed and exposed.
Do pro lifers care about homeless children AFTER they are born?
@abcyz: Do pro choicers?
@abcyz: No.
@gregory: Why not? They are supposed to care about ALL life, no matter what hence their pro life title.
@Tony Daly: Article about STIs but Tony yet again tries to turn it into hate of the Catholic Church. Well done.
@abcyz: pro choicers apparently support a woman wether she chooses abortion or to proceed with having the child. So when she chooses to have the child are you there for her? Or do you not care once shes made her choice?
@Ian Phillip Creaner: I hope that for the sake of those that still believe and those in future that the church becomes a more caring and tolerant one not just here but worldwide.
I don’t believe but for those that do I hope they learn to question their church in order to bring this about.
So a strong HSE message to teens must be: don’t play mum and dad until you’re married.
@Garreth Byrne: what has marriage got to do with it? How about a decent level of sex education without the religious dogma and morality attached.
@Garreth Byrne: Marriage prevents/cures STIs and teen pregnancies??
@Garreth Byrne: no i think the actual message might be protect yourself ! The no sex before marriage thing has been tried and failed miserably
@Garreth Byrne: yeah because that message worked so well for the catholic church,
Plenty of people have no interest in marriage, that doesn’t mean sex is bad or shouldn’t happen.
Only a idiot links marriage with sex
@Paul Fahey: do parents not teach their kids sex education ? Nothing to do with religion and everything to do with parents . Are they not talking to their kids about sex ?
@Barry Somers and others: The HSE and its predecessor has thrown tons of sex education at teenagers, bankrolled with money from the exchequer, but as the above story notes, a HSE programme director has said ” four in ten sexually active teenagers are not using a condom every time they have sex, which puts them at risk of contracting an STI. What is particularly worrying is that more than one in ten sexually active teenagers reported that they never used a condom when having sex.” In the Irish drink culture, where one or both teenage partners are tanked with alcohol, it is not surprising that condom use is so low. I think there is room for moral and philosophical education which encourages teenagers and twentysomethings to ask vital questions like What is the Meaning of Life? What is authentic and inauthentic existence? (cf. Heidegger & Sartre) and What is the meaning of marriage? (cf. various religious texts.) Sex + alcohol-as-recreation, without attention to deeper questions about human existence, will continue to produce STDs, teen pregnancies, broken lives and all the rest of it.
@Garreth Byrne: ohh, yes a deep and profound philosophical dissertation will be 100% effective in deterring horny teenagers from sexual relation.
Teenagers respond to moral and philosophical lecturing.
Brilliant !
@Garreth Byrne:ah here what
@Garreth Byrne: did you?
And to think the Holy Rosary brigade were against contraception for so long, better to incarcerate teenage girls in sweat shops and sell or dump infants in sewage tanks.
@Tariq Ibn Ziyad: Better to behead muslim victims of rape and sentence gay muslims to death
So teenagers are now going to get checked more than before. That’s great to hear.
Porn, obesity, kodi/ netflix, girls wanting their own careers, money, fear of girls that guys not wanting to be with again if their v is affected by having a baby and or the c section scar not looking great on your holiers in the sun are also factors. Another good news story.
Teens don’t finger no more either
@Paul Murphy: so you have been watching Mickey Flanagan.
STIs are on the rise in general so it makes sense that teens would also be affected
And this does not include HPV infection levels.
@Tony Daly: that’s close to 100%. No point even reporting it.
That’s Roman Catholic Church ethos for you!
@Tony Daly: No. The Catholic Roman church does not condone sex before marraige don’t mind sex between teenage children who have not even grown up yet and rightly so.
@Tony Daly: All stories relate to the Catholic Church…blah blah blah
Sexual activity begins much earlier than it did 20 or 30 years ago. In those days some doctors would not prescribe the pill and even fewer prescribed the morning after pill. Many of the young women nowadays will get the HPV virus which can result in cervical cancer. Even if they get the HPV vaccine they will have to get a smear test regularly up to about 60. I saw a woman who died from cervical cancer at 28. Getting pregnant to get a social house is still quite popular in less affluent areas. The abortion pill is widely used nowadays although they have to get it illegally from UK. The middle-class women are well up on this and the usual trip to UK for an abortion is likely to drop in the next few years. The condom is not so popular as it was but it does protect against STDs and genital herpes is a worry -it gives them recurrent pain for the years ahead. The women still have to take care as many of the men are totally irresponsible. If a man is violent towards a woman she should find somebody else as further episodes are very likely. Think carefully about putting up with alcoholic men or drug users. You and your children will live in a terrible world. Get a good education so that you will be independent if necessary.
Put Breda O’Brien in charge as the anti extra marital sex Czar. She will love bossing the kids and imposing her own views.
Dirty buggers
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