RESOURCES

Facts

  • Over 750,000 teens become pregnant each year.1
  • Over 80 girls 19 and under every hour of the day find out they are pregnant.2
  • 82% of teen pregnancies are unplanned.2 
  • 50% of teen moms drop out of high school.3
  • 1 in 4 sexually active teens are already infected with an STD3
  • Six in ten teens who have had sex say they wish they would have waited.1
  • The U.S. has the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the industrialized world.1
  • Though 15-24-year-olds represent only one-quarter of the sexually active population, they account for nearly half of the 20 million new cases of STIs each year. 2
  • 10,000 teens are infected by STIs per day, one every eight seconds!2
  • Some young people, including those who have had abstinence education, consider oral and anal sex to be abstinent behaviors and do not realize these behaviors present risks of STI transmission.3
  • Those who abstain from sex until marriage significantly add to their chance for avoiding problems and finding happiness.4

1. National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy

2. Guttmacher Institute

3. Center for Disease Control and Prevention

4. Hooked: New Science on How Casual Sex Is Affecting Our Children. Joe McIlhaney and Freda McKissic Bush