LANCASTER, S.C. — The Lancaster County School Board approved a recommendation 7-0 on Tuesday, April 16, to continue the district’s teen pregnancy prevention program for both its middle and high schools in a partnership with The Children’s Council of Lancaster County.
Angelica Barrett, executive director of the council, gave a presentation at the board meeting on the teen pregnancy prevention program, along with statistics about the teen birth rate.
Lancaster County has a birth rate of 23 per 1,000 students, according to Barrett, making the county 23rd out of 46 counties in the state. The county as a whole has seen a decrease of 76% since 1981, but Barrett says more work needs to be done.
“If we compare ourselves to New Hampshire, they have the lowest teen birth rate in the U.S. at 5.4%. If we look at Arkansas, which has the highest teen birth rate at 26.5%, South Carolina sits firmly in the middle of the teen birth rate at 18.3%. That’s kind of high compared to the rest of the U.S. when we look at their teen birth rate of 13.9%,” Barrett said.
Even though numbers throughout the county are decreasing, Barrett says the state’s rate is decreasing at a consistent downtrend, while Lancaster County’s is fluctuating.
“We have our years when we are up and down. Even though we’re trending lower than we have since 1991, there’s still work that needs to be done to keep this rate going down a little more consistently,” she said.
Barrett also brought up concern over the rise of sexually transmitted diseases across the U.S., with half of 26 million infections since 2018 among ages 15-24.
To prevent numbers from peaking, Barrett suggested the district continue several strategies implemented through middle and high schools across Lancaster County. These include employing known protective factors, programs about sexual education, abstinence in middle schools and creating prevention programs in faith-based communities.
“We’re hoping that if we can continue to implement strategies, we will see that we will go back down in our birth rates,” Barrett said.
