Free Republic

More than 40 percent of adolescent girls, ages 15 to 19, are sexually active, according to the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology. And some 750,000 teen girls get pregnant every year. So what did ACOG recommend this week to prevent teen pregnancies? Offer under-age girls “long-acting reversible contraception” – intrauterine devices (IUDs) and contraceptive implants. “I absolutely think that teens should be using these methods as first line,” Dr. Lisa Perriera, an ACOG member, an OB/GYN at CaseMedicalCenter in Cleveland, told ABC News. “The important thing for teens to know,” she said, “is that these devices are an on/off...

Liberal critics periodically complain that federally funded "abstinence only" sex-education materials are full of false or misleading statements about the effectiveness of condoms and other issues. Now the Bush administration is firing back, charging that programs that endorse condom use also are marred by imbalance and inaccuracies. The latest round in the sex-ed culture war comes in a 40-page report by the Department of Health and Human Services that critiqued "comprehensive sex-education curricula" - materials that teach about both abstinence and the use of condoms and other protective methods. The analysis - requested two years ago by Sen. Tom Coburn,...

Rhode Island education officials have banned from public schools a federally funded abstinence program that civil rights advocates said embraced sexist stereotypes and included a voluntary student health survey that violated privacy laws. Lawyers at the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union first complained last year that a now-abandoned textbook used by Heritage of Rhode Island taught students that girls should wear clothing that doesn't invite "lustful thoughts" from boys. The book described men as "strong" and "courageous" while women were called "caring." A speaker on an accompanying videotape said abstinence helped him "honor my relationship with...

NEW YORK (AP) - The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit Monday alleging that the federal government has improperly used taxpayer dollars to fund Christian religious activities in a nationwide program called the Silver Ring Thing that uses music and comedy skits to promote premarital abstinence among teens. The Silver Ring Thing - which has held events in dozens of cities over the past five years - is an offshoot of the John Guest Evangelistic Team, a Christian ministry based in Sewickley, Pa. Since 2003, the program has received more than $1 million from the Department of Health and...

Bush Advocates Abstinence-Only Education WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration is proposing to double spending on sexual abstinence programs that bar any discussion of birth control or condoms to prevent pregnancy or AIDS despite a lack of evidence that such programs work. A study by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on declining birth and pregnancy rates among teenagers concludes that prevention programs should emphasize abstinence and contraception. "Both are important," said Dr. John Santelli, the lead author of the study, which has not been published. In Minnesota, a study found that sexual activity doubled among...

NewsMax.com's religion editor Fr. Mike Reilly weighs in on Planned Parenthood's latest assault on the Bush administration. If you thought America's public enemy number one was the threat posed by radical Islamic terrorists or their state sponsors like Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein, you were wrong. At least according to the Planned Parenthood Federation (PPF), who says that President Bush is in fact the greatest threat to American women. Citing "a wealth of factual evidence to document George W. Bush's seemingly inexplicable war on women," PPF documents the President's pro-life agenda on several fronts, which include: * Reducing Access...