“There’s no medical provider in this county who wants to see our adolescents be sexually active,” Quigley added. “We would love for kids to go to their parents and say ‘This is what I’m thinking about doing.’ But the truth is a lot of kids can’t or won’t do that. I would like for kids not to be sexually active until they’re 25, but that’s not reality. They don’t adhere to pledges they sign to be abstinent.”
She would like to think the girls are getting care, and having someone talking to them about their decisions, about sexually-transmitted diseases, and suggesting to them that perhaps they’re not ready for sexual activity, Quigley added.
She said she’s delivered babies born to 13 and 14 year old girls here.
Dan Weingarten of Hayward said he has never thought that banning the dispensing of birth control pills to teenagers would stop sex any more than banning beer would stop kids from drinking. “But we have laws that say beer or buy cigarettes are not to be available to underage kids. This is a moral issue: does the county want to contribute to delinquency by giving underage kids (these pills or devices for birth control). We should not undermine the rights and responsibilities of parents in raising their children. Using Title 10 funds allows for an end run around parental rights.”
Eileen Simak, a public health nurse for Sawyer County, said Title 10 does not serve just young people, but adults also. If the county gets rid of the reproductive health program, “we will be putting a lot of other women in jeopardy as well — from 18 to 45 year olds,” she said.
Another benefit of coming in and seeing a public health nurse “is something you can’t underestimate,” Simak said. “When someone walks in, they can see a nurse right away. We do so much, and probably spend more time with them than other providers do. We look at the whole client and can refer them for services. It’s a huge benefit to some of these young people. The community would not be well-served by losing this program. You would do the community a huge disservice.”
Simak said the first thing a public health nurse asks a minor girl about when she comes in is: “Have you involved your parent and have you considered abstinence. We have a lot of information on abstinence in our offices.”
Sanders said that as a governmental unit, the public health department can provide these services at no cost or a lesser cost if necessary. Board member Arlene Mizerka said the North Woods Community Health Center in Hayward also provides services on a sliding fee sale related to the person’s income.
“We do have a problem in our county with teen births,” Sanders said. “Our teen birth rate for females under 20 is dramatically higher than the state average and is increasing.” Wisconsin statistics show a teen birth rate of 49.7 per 1,000 females age 15 to 19 in Sawyer County in 2005 compared to a state average of 30 births per 1,000 in that age group.
“So our intervention with that (age group) hopefully is benefitting the community in trying to reduce those numbers,” Sanders said. Board member Shirley Suhsen said she is aware of parents Discount cigarettes who send their daughters to the public health nurse’s office.
Sanders said the public health department has three primary prorities in the women’s reproductive health program: early identification of pregnancy, promotion of abstinence, and free involvement of parents in choices and decisions made by adolescents. A quarter of pregnancies in our county aren’t even seen in the first tri-mester. Those are big concerns from a public health standpoint. We haven’t been as successful as we’d like in intervening with that population. It’s certainly concerning to all of us to see 14 and 15 year olds coming in, having children that early.
“We have made it clear to our health professionals to try to encourage parental involvement if at all possible,” Sanders added. “But as Dr. Quigley has indicated, there is a law that basically protects minors from including their parents in some of these decisions. So it’s beyond our control. A federal law gives those kinds of rights to that group (under Title 10).”
Ornberg said surveys she’s seen show that “the more that birth control is promoted among minors, the higher the pregnancy rate. It gives tacit consent to these young people having sexual relationships. Because they’re children and are not very responsible, they don’t use them appropriately. It’s kind of a snowballing effect.”
Public Health Director Pat Harrington was unable to be present tax free cigarettes at last Friday’s meeting. Sanders said she has collaborated with community groups to encourage abstinence programming.
