Teen Pregnancy

RECENT STUDIES ON TEEN pregnancy and abortion invite us to connect the statistical dots. But when we do, we don't get much of a picture. The Guttmacher Institute, a research group that focuses on sexual health and family issues, reports that 33 states have made it more difficult for poor women and teenagers to get reproductive health care. At a time when the public debate on abortion is roaring to new life, it doesn't make much sense to limit a woman's access to information and services that will prevent an unintended pregnancy, but there you have it. In related news, The New York Times reported that its analysis of data shows that laws that require minors to notify their parents or get their permission to have an abortion have not reduced the number of teen abortions, as had been hoped.

Six years ago, a front-page story reported that oral sex had become a party game among middle-schoolers, and the news sent a shock wave through the ranks of parents who had been thinking they could put their feet up on the coffee table until high school began. That first news report was purely anecdotal, however, and for a while parents could continue to tell themselves, "Not my child." After all, how could an act of such intimacy have replaced "Spin the Bottle" among children who were still unashamed to sleep with stuffed animals?

DR. PETER L. Beilenson has a prescription for the nation and for the Democratic Party: more straight-talking and outspoken leaders - and another doctor in Congress. The doctor he has in mind, of course, is himself. As Baltimore's health commissioner, he was responsible for preparing a major city for weapons of mass destruction. And he's been dealing with other weapons of mass destruction on city streets: HIV/AIDS, drug abuse, teen pregnancy, violence and a failure to confront them. With the support of two mayors - Kurt L. Schmoke and Martin O'Malley - he confronted them all with considerable success.

It takes two to get a teenage girl pregnant, yet most health and public policy focuses on her. The theory is that if she can be motivated to delay sexual activity or to protect herself with birth control, the problem of teen pregnancy will disappear. The biology is correct, but the policy isn't. Especially when the evidence shows that boys feel more pressure to have sex than girls, are less protected by parents, become sexually active earlier, report more embarrassment about being known as a virgin, have sex more often, have more partners, and are notoriously poor users of the health care delivery system.

TOMORROW is National Teen Pregnancy Prevention Day, as if all it takes to prevent our babies from having babies is a little extra attention from grown-ups one day a year. Any parent worth his or her stripes knows that sex education and the conveyance of sexual values is a lifelong conversation with children that should begin at the changing table. But it is the most awkward and difficult conversation we have with our kids and, quite frankly, most of us don't do it very well. Imagine how grateful we would be if the clock actually ran out on "The Talk" tomorrow at midnight, and we could go back to arguing with our kids about the state of the bathroom and whose turn it is to load the dishwasher this week.

A new, state-by-state breakdown of teen-age pregnancy and abortion rates in 2000 shows declines among all racial and ethnic groups and in every state, continuing a decade-long downward trend that researchers attribute to better contraception and less, or more cautious, sexual activity. Overall, the national pregnancy rate declined by 2 percent between 1999 and 2000, and fell by 28 percent from its 1990 peak, according to data compiled by the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports abortion rights Nationwide, one-third of pregnancies among 15- to 19-year-olds ended in abortion in 2000, and the rate of abortions per 1,000 women in that age group declined to 24, down from a high of 43.5 per 1,000 in the late 1980s.

W HEN THE NATIONAL Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy held a fancy press conference on Capitol Hill to announce that teens say their parents have the biggest influence on their sexual decisions, I was reminded of an old Saturday Night Live skit. Do you remember when Chevy Chase and Jane Curtin would anchor Weekend Update and announce that General Franco of Spain was still dead? What was the news here? Teen pregnancy is no laughing matter, but the National Campaign, as well as other researchers, have been reporting for a while that parents have more influence on their children than peers have.

The Harford County Board of Education is scheduled to vote next month on changes in the middle school sex education curriculum -- to include ma- terial on sexually transmitted diseases and teen pregnancy -- that would bring the school system in line with most others in the state. A committee recommended the changes in the fall after finding that Harford lagged behind most other systems in its curriculum. Schools spokesman Don Morrison said the administration office has received about a dozen e-mails since early last month on the issue.

THE NAACP, its critics say, is nothing more these days than a wing of the Democratic party. The organization's not about the business of civil rights anymore, the naysayers crow. Black conservative Ward Connerly dismissed today's NAACP as "largely irrelevant." Focus more organizational energy on the problems of teen pregnancy and crime among blacks, the scolds urge NAACP leaders. Forget about fighting racial injustices. The problem is, fighting racial injustice was exactly why the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was formed.

RAVENMANIA came late to Baltimore. Throughout the season, it was confined to true football fans, an audible but distinct minority. Not till the second post-season victory, over Tennessee, did the fever sweep over the population. And now, we're going to Tampa. Suddenly the town is purple. The point is that the Ravens' triumph is the people's collective distinction. All Baltimoreans are somehow ennobled, made taller and more virtuous. Fate guided the arm of Trent Dilfer, destiny blocked for Shannon Sharpe.