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**__Teen Pregnancy__**
by Heather Dryburgh Health Reports, Vol. 12, No. 1 Statistics Canada, Catalogue 82-003 During the last quarter century, there has been an overall decline in the teenage pregnancy rate in Canada, perhaps reflecting the availability of contraceptives, and the increased awareness of the risks of unprotected sex brought about by the AIDS epidemic.1 Nevertheless, in 1997, an estimated 19,724 women aged 15 to 19 gave birth, and a slightly larger number in this age range—21,233—had an abortion. The social stigma that once attended out-of-wedlock pregnancy may have diminished; however, the risks of serious health consequences remain for babies born to mothers still in their teens. Children of teenagers are more likely to have low birth weights, and to suffer the associated health problems.2 Pregnant teens themselves are also at greater risk of health problems, including, for example, anemia, hypertension, renal disease, eclampsia and depressive disorders.3,4 As well, teenagers who engage in unprotected sex are putting their own health at risk of sexually transmitted infections.1 Teenage pregnancy also has economic consequences. Childbearing may curtail education and thereby reduce a young woman’s employment prospects in a job market that requires ever higher levels of training.8,9 In addition, recessions in the early 1980s and 1990s meant that to maintain an adequate standard of living, dual earning became the norm in many Canadian households.10 But teenagers who give birth, particularly at ages 15 to 17, are likely to be single. Consequently, most teenage mothers lack a partner to contribute to the household income.3 This article focusses on recent trends in pregnancy rates and outcomes (live birth, induced abortion or fetal loss) for 15- to 19-year-olds (see //[|Methods]// and //[|Definitions]//). In 1997, an estimated 42,162 pregnancies of women aged 15 to 19 ended in birth, abortion or miscarriage. The number of pregnancies had declined steadily since 1994, when the estimated total was 46,753 ([|Appendix Table A]) (see [|//Sexual activity and contraceptive use//]). At the same time, the teenage pregnancy rate dropped, and by 1997, it stood at 42.7 pregnancies per 1,000 women aged 15 to 19. The decrease in the teenage pregnancy rate in Canada began several years later than that in the United States3,12 (Chart 1). Nevertheless, the US rate remains about double the Canadian rate13 (see //[|International comparisons]//).
 * Short-term trends**


 * Chart 1
 * Teenage pregnancy rates, by age of women at end of pregnancy, women aged 15 to 19, Canada and United States, 1974 to 1997

//Data sources://** //References 5,6,7; Health Statistics Division; Canadian Vital Statistics Data Base; Canadian Institute for Health Information; Alan Guttmacher Institute// ||

Older teens are more likely than younger teens to be sexually active.8 This is reflected in much higher pregnancy rates at ages 18 to 19 than at ages 15 to 17: 68.9 versus 25.5 per 1,000 Canadian women in the respective age groups in 1997. Nonetheless, even at ages 18 to 19, the pregnancy rate was well below that of women aged 20 to 24 (100.6 per 1,000; data not shown). Teenage pregnancy rates tend to be higher in the North and the Prairie provinces than in other regions (Chart 2). In 1997, the rate in the Northwest Territories was 123.3 pregnancies per 1,000 and over 60 per 1,000 in the Yukon and in Manitoba. On the other hand, rates in Newfoundland and New Brunswick were less than 35 per 1,000