Hispanic teen pregnancy rate is high

A Chatham program is recognized for efforts to give teens a sense of responsibility

CHAPEL HILL -- Latina teenagers are more likely than not to get pregnant before their 20th birthday.

Fifty-one percent of Hispanic girls become pregnant at least once before age 20, compared to 35 percent of all adolescent girls, according to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.

The overall teen pregnancy rate has declined by more than one-third over the past decade, and the campaign has set a goal of cutting that by another third by 2015.

However, the campaign's media program manager, Erika Vexler, said the Hispanic teenage population is expected to grow almost eight times as fast as the total adolescent population over the next 15 years. That boom, she said, could offset the recent reduction in the overall teen pregnancy rate.

"We have to focus on this community," Vexler said. "As a nation, we all need to care."

Vexler spoke Thursday at a symposium on Hispanic teenagers sponsored by the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Coalition of North Carolina, held at the Friday Center at UNC-Chapel Hill. The keynote speaker was Hector Sanchez-Flores, a senior research associate at the University of California-San Francisco.

Sanchez-Flores acknowledged that Latinos tend to marry and start families at earlier ages than the general population, but he said that doesn't mean they accept teenage sex or pregnancy.

He quoted a Mexican saying, "Todo a su tiempo" -- "Everything in its time" -- and said Hispanic elders might remark on a teenage pregnancy by saying, "Eso no paso a su tiempo," or "This didn't happen in its time."

Sanchez-Flores said Latinos celebrate the birth of a new baby and welcome a new member of the family even when the circumstances are less than ideal. That might lead others to think Hispanics don't see a problem with teenage parenthood, he said, but that would be a false impression. "They do mind," he said.

Sanchez-Flores said the problem is that sex is a taboo subject for many Latinos, and young men are often left to figure things out for themselves.

"You set him up to fail later on in life if you give him a pass on the little stuff," the psychologist said. "They want to do better than, 'Boys will be boys.' "

Sanchez-Flores said some programs have helped young Hispanic men take more responsibility for their actions.

On Thursday, the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Coalition recognized one of those programs, Hablando Claro, or Plain Talk, through which the Siler City-based nonprofit Chatham County Together teaches Hispanic community leaders and parents how to communicate with teens about personal responsibility and decision-making.

"Reaching out to Latinos to prevent teen pregnancy has been successful," Sanchez-Flores said.

The focus, Vexler said, should be on expanding such programs.

"They need a lot more support," Vexler said.