By: Vira David, Teen Program Manager, and Samantha Sileno, Public Health Associate

Thirty-two percent!  That’s how much the teenage birth rate in Baltimore City has dropped since 2009, surpassing the Healthy Baltimore 2015 goal of a 20 percent reduction.  Our youth, through their voices in the city’s Know What U Want, U CHOOSE campaign, are playing a critical role in this success.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen recently highlighted this accomplishment in an event held at the Baltimore City Healthy Teens and Young Adults Clinic at the Druid Health Center.  Both the Mayor and Health Commissioner cited the influence of teens, including 19-year-old Beraka Bland, in being essential to the city serving the sexual and reproductive health needs of all young people in Baltimore City.

Teen pregnancy has a long-term impact on the health and well being of our community. Teen moms and dads drop out of high school at higher rates than non-parenting teens and earn less in their lifetime as a result. Children of teen parents are more likely to have problems in school, be unemployed and have an increased risk of being incarcerated. By reducing teen pregnancy, we’re investing in the long-term social and economic health of our city.

Beyond the community level impacts, deciding whether to become sexually active is a deeply personal issue faced by all of our young people. We want to empower teens to make their future goals a priority. By providing birth control options and sex education, teens will be more prepared to make informed decisions on their future well-being and sexual health.

In 2010, the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative (TPPI) was established by Baltimore City Health Department’s B’more for Healthy Babies, in partnership with the Family League of Baltimore. TPPI’s main focus is fostering youth advocacy and providing Baltimore teens clinical access to birth control.

TPPI brought together a group of teens and young adults ages 14-20 which became known as the Youth Advisory Council (YAC).  YAC drove the “Know What U Want: U Choose” social marketing campaign that provides youth with family planning education to empower them for the future.  From designing the website and materials to participating in “guerilla” marketing campaigns (including spray chalking city streets with the U CHOOSE logo and website), YAC members developed a campaign that meets teens on their terms to give them the information and connection to services they need.

Accessing sexual and reproductive health services can be daunting and uncomfortable for teens. To help our teens, TPPI collaborates with healthcare providers to offer a full range of effective birth control methods regardless of a teen’s income-level or age.  Beyond clinical services, TPPI’s growing partnership with Baltimore City Schools is enhancing the age-appropriate, comprehensive health education received by Baltimore City youth. Students can now access school-based health centers that provide on-site clinical services during the school year at 14 public schools.

Despite the reduced rates of teen births in Baltimore, there is a lot of work left to do. The city’s current teen birth rate is more than double compared to the state of Maryland and nearly twice as high as the national average. There is also a great disparity of African-American teens and Hispanic teens having more teen births than white teens in Baltimore. More peer outreach and education needs to be done to help reduce this disparity facing teens in these communities.

We hope to further reduce teenage birth rates by increasing access to youth friendly services and by building the leadership and outreach skills of our Baltimore teens.  By placing our youth at the center of our strategy, we will be able to support all Baltimore City youth in making informed and supported choices about their future.

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