The War On Women Continues ...

First Planned Parenthood and now …. Why the Trump administration is cutting teen pregnancy prevention funding

"Most teenagers feel uncomfortable talking about sex, but not 16-year-old Bryanna Ely. As a youth leader for the Buffalo, New York-based teen pregnancy prevention program HOPE Buffalo, Ely talks to not only other teens but also adults. She explains how they can help teens when it comes to their emotional, physical and sexual health, abstinence and birth control."

"It's definitely made me more comfortable around health providers, because I was very nervous and not willing to talk about it, but then once I joined HOPE Buffalo, it's an easy subject to talk about. Well, not that easy, but it's easy enough to talk about that I don't feel so uncomfortable," said Ely, who will be entering her junior year in high school this month.

While volunteering with HOPE Buffalo at a local community center, Ely said, she remembered meeting another teenage girl, sharing sexual health information with her and feeling like she made a difference."

"She took in all the information and she said she would not get pregnant until she was 28 or 30," Ely said. "I joined HOPE Buffalo because I wanted to make a change in my community and make sure that these teenagers who didn't have a voice had a voice."

"Yet federal funding for such teen pregnancy prevention programs in the United States is now on the chopping block.

Instead, the US Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement that it's continuing to review best approaches, which it says "will be guided by science and a firm commitment to giving all youth the information and skills they need to improve their prospects for optimal health outcomes."

"Among the leadership within the Department of Health and Human Services, Secretary Tom Price and Valerie Huber, chief of staff to the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, have been proponents of abstinence-only education programs." 

"Around the Fourth of July, Stan Martin, project director of HOPE Buffalo, received a notice from Health and Human Services' Office of Adolescent Health that indicated funding would end next June, after just three years, instead of continuing to fund the program for the expected five years."

"Other grant recipients of the Teen Pregnancy Prevention program across the country received the same notice.The Office of Adolescent Health's Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program currently funds 84 grants to reduce teen pregnancy across clinics, schools and communities, by implementing and evaluating prevention programs and supporting technology- and program-based approaches, according to the office's website. Their end date is now June 30." 
Read entire article at  http://www.cnn.com/2017/08/17/health/teen-pregnancy-prevention-programs-funding/index.html

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