Teenage Birth Rates in Massachusetts Highest Among Hispanics; Legislation Needed To Address the Issue, Experts Say

Births to Hispanic teenagers living in the western part of Massachusetts — a state with one of the lowest teen pregnancy rates in the nation — are more prevalent than teen births among other groups and the rate is growing, a health expert said at a conference on Monday, the Springfield Republican reports.

According to Patricia Quinn, executive director of the Massachusetts Alliance on Teen Pregnancy, who spoke at an event sponsored by the Youth Empowerment Adolescent Health Network, 65% of teenage births in Springfield, Mass., were to Hispanics in 2006, up from 48% a decade earlier. Sarah Perez-McAdoo, co-founder of the network and an obstetrician-gynecologist at Baystate Medical Center, said the Hispanic teenage pregnancy rate in Massachusetts is six times higher than that of non-Hispanics. “*

*From: www.kaisernetwork.org
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

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