Birmingham: a teenage pregnancy blackspot

6th Mar 2010

DESPITE efforts over the past decade to reduce teenage preg­nancy rates within Birm­ing­ham, the city is still listed as a blackspot in Europe.

It well known that Britain has the high­est teenage preg­nancy rate in West­ern Europe, and the West Mid­lands is one of the worst areas in the country.

In 2007, con­cep­tion rates amongst those under the age of eigh­teen were 41.7 per thou­sand in Eng­land; alarm­ingly the rates in Birm­ing­ham were over ten-per-thousand higher.

As a result, there were 1,119 teenage preg­nan­cies in Birm­ing­ham alone, which has raised alarm as to what has caused this fail­ure to reduce rates.

Last year, dur­ing an event in Birmingham’s Coun­cil House, a sur­vey exe­cuted by young peo­ple high­lighted that new mea­sures were needed in Birmingham’s schools in order to com­bat the grow­ing preg­nancy rates. These major shake-ups tar­geted sex and rela­tion­ship education.

Despite six­teen rec­om­men­da­tions, involv­ing the pro­vi­sion of more infor­ma­tion for par­ents and the expan­sion of the health edu­ca­tion ser­vice, Birm­ing­ham is still named a blackspot in Europe.

Across ten years (from 1998 to 2008) efforts to reduce the teenage baby trend have suc­ceeded, but by a mere 137 conceptions.

The chief exec­u­tive of Birmingham’s Brook sex ual health clinic, Penny Bar­ber, high­lights that: ‘the region has spec­tac­u­larly failed’.

Although Barber’s out­look appears bleak, the Gov­ern­ment holds faith that num­bers can still be halved nationally.