Comprehensive and reliable sex education, access to reliable contraception, access to safe and legal abortions, preventing teen pregnancies.
It can be justifiably argued that the states with the highest rates of teen pregnancy (and STDs) are the states with high rates of incarceration.
Arguments and citations below:
Four of the states in the US have a higher prison population per 100,000 than any nation abroad.
Louisiana. Delaware. Mississippi. Oklahoma.
Teen pregnancies (2008 stats):
Louisiana is Number 8 in highest rates of teen pregnancies.
Outlier Delaware is Number 7.
Mississippi is Number 2.
Oklahoma is Number 9.
Consider the states with the ten highest rates of teen pregnancies and their rankings in incarceration:
Top-ranked New Mexico is 35th. OK, the exception that proves the rule. I suspect that cultural factors are in play here.
No. 2: Mississippi, third ranked in incarceration.
No. 3: Texas, fifth in incarceration.
No. 4: Nevada, 13th.
No. 5: Arkansas, 8th.
No. 6: Arizona, also 6th in incarceration.
No. 7: Delaware, 19th. This reflects the population density of Delaware. It may house more prisoners than any nation on earth, save for the U.S., but its ranking is 443 per 100,000 population, ranking it lower than less densely populated Southern states.
No. 8: Louisiana, Number 1. It must be noted that a lot of prisoners from other states are housed in Louisiana, states like Alabama have prisoners in Louisiana.
No 9: Oklahoma, Third.
No 10: Georgia, 11th.
Conclusion: Numbers and stats never mesh as perfectly as one would wish them to, but I think these numbers and correlations raise interesting speculation.
Such as, the niceties of planned pregnancies: a child that is desired and planned for in terms of prenatal nutrition and care, obstetric care, family and societal support for new humans (It does take a village to raise a child, God damn it!).
And, I've got to put in a plug for early childhood intervention, nutrition, education, etc.
Corrections are welcomed where I have ranked states in the wrong category. Also, spelling, etc.
Also, a major shoutout to former Vermont Governor Howard Dean and his early childhood programs:
People may have laughed at the presidential aspirations of then-Gov. Howard Dean. He is a trained physician, and when he was governor of Vermont, he instituted a voluntary home visitation program in the state. Now we have the research to back up his idea.
The Nurse Family Partnership begins home visits when a woman is pregnant though a child’s second birthday. The research has shown that participants in this program have had few arrests, lower rates of drug and alcohol abuse and lower rates of child abuse. They also found that children whose mothers participated in the program had better cognitive abilities by age six, lower anxiety, better self-esteem and, by age 12, they had improved math and language ablates and fewer school absences.
The economic benefits of early childhood education are staggering. I often hear on radio that Head Start does not work. If it does not work in certain geographic areas, it is because it begins too late. Cognitive interventions, such as increasing the number of different words a child hears, should begin within the first year of life. The brain makes the connections then and prunes the connections that are not useful. Waiting until four years old is simply too late.
I've discovered many informational flaws in this arena. Most of the studies in regard to early childhood nutrition are overly scholarly and snotty. It's basic good sense to make sure that children are well-nourished in order for brain development to flourish, but here's
a nice place to begin:
Nutrition has been called the single greatest environmental influence on babies in the womb and during infancy, and it remains essential throughout the first years of life.
A proper balance of nutrients in this formative period is critical for normal brain development. Shortages of nutrients such as iron and iodine can impair cognitive and motor development, and these effects are often irreversible. Similarly, there is growing evidence that DHA, an essential fatty acid, is a key component of the intensive production of synapses that makes the first years of life a critical period of learning and development. Many other nutrients—choline, folic acid, and zinc, to name just a few—have been linked specifically to early brain functioning.
The role of nutrition in brain development is complex. The effects of most nutrient shortages depend on the extent and duration of the shortage, and in many cases, the brain’s need for a particular nutrient changes throughout its development. Early shortages can reduce cell production; later shortages can affect cell size and complexity. Nutrient deficits also affect the complex chemical processes of the brain and can lead to less efficient communication between brain cells.