DENVER, Aug. 22 (UPI) -- Only one Denver school makes contraceptives available to students, even though a 2007 task force recommended clinics at six high schools, officials said.
Any student at the Bruce Randolph School whose parent has signed them up for service at the school-based clinic can get condoms, birth control pills and emergency contraception, The Denver Post reported Sunday. The clinic is operated by Denver Health.
The school is for sixth- through 12th-graders.
In 2007, when the task force made its recommendations, the Denver teen birth rate was nearly double the state rate, with 41.5 out of every 1,000 girls between 15 and 17 having babies, the report said. That compared to 22.1 per 1,000 across the state.
The Denver rate dropped to 30.8 in 2009, but that was still far more than the state rate of 19.7. Nationwide, the birth rate for girls in that age group was 22 per 1,000 in 2006, The Post said.
Hispanic girls in Denver were nearly 3.5 times as likely to give birth, with 77.4 births for every 1,000, compared to the state rate, the report said..
Jennifer Gonzalez, a Denver parent who supports the new services and who had three children by her 20th birthday, told the Post: "In the poor neighborhoods, we have a whole generation of kids who are being raised by teen parents who don't want their children to go through what we went through."
