Isn’t it amazing that sound public policy works a lot better to reduce teenage pregnancy than lecturing girls about keeping their virginity? Giving teenaged girls access to long-term reversible contraceptives is twenty times more effective at preventing pregnancy than giving them The Pill, and infinitely more successful than abstinence-only education. Teenage motherhood has plummeted in this country over the last twenty-five years or so, but it’s falling fastest in states like Colorado that are offering up free access to contraceptive implants.
It’s especially effective at preventing second pregnancies, as young women are given the option of having the implant done at the hospital after they give birth.
And this obviously reduces the costs of providing social services a great deal, so it ought to be supported by the party that hates taxes and opposes abortions.
But, is it?
