CDC: Ohio below national average for teen birth rate

A new report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has found that the teen pregnancy rate in Ohio is slightly below the national average (Source: “Mississippi has highest teen birth rate, CDC says; Ohio below the average,” Associated Press/Akron Beacon-Journal, Jan. 7, 2009).

The CDC study of all 2006 birth certificates found 40 births for every 1,000 women, ages 15 through 19. The national rate for females in that age group was about 42 per 1,000, which marked a 3-percent increase over 2005 and the first time in 15 years that the rate increased from the prior year.

The highest rate in the nation was in Mississippi, where there were 68 births for every 1,000 teenage women. New Hampshire, with a rate of 19 per 1,000, was the nation's lowest.