Abstinence is the major reason for falling birth and pregnancy rates among unmarried teens, according to a landmark study released in April by the Physicians Consortium. The four-year study (from 1991-1995) indicated that abstinence accounted for 100 percent of the decline in teen births and 67 percent of the decline in unmarried teen pregnancy.

Hal Wallis, chairman of the 2000-member Physicians Consortium said the study "establishes that abstinence is the most dominant single contributing factor to the decline in the teen birth and pregnancy rates. By contrast, the birthrate to single girls who were sexually active actually increased, despite the fact that this group used more condoms."

Tonya Bowman, abstinence coordinator of the Door of Hope Pregnancy Care Center in Madisonville, said she is not surprised by the study’s results. "Abstinence until marriage is something that works," Bowman said. "It’s something new, different from what the health department has been teaching."

The study found that the percentage of single teens that were abstinent increased from 53 to 56 percent between 1991 and 1995. The birthrate among sexually active single teens increased from 95.3 to 100.8, the researchers found.

Dr. Joanna Mohn, primary researcher of the study, attributes the increased birthrate to a decrease in abortion. Yet the increase occurred even though more teenage girls were using birth control. Consider that in 1990, 66.1 percent of girls aged 15 to 19 reported using some method of contraception at first intercourse. By 1995, the number increased to 71.8 percent.

The timing of the study’s release is significant—just as Congress prepares to debate the reauthorization of federal abstinence education funding. Each year, $50 million is distributed among the states exclusively for teen abstinence education programs. Birth control advocates like Planned Parenthood have aggressively lobbied to add a condom component to the program.

But during the 1970s and 1980s -- an era where birth control was aggressively marketed to teens--the National Center for Health Statistics documented a significant rise in teen pregnancies and births. Mohn said the decline in teen pregnancy in the 1990s is indisputably linked to more teens choosing abstinence.

In a letter to Congress, Wallis implored legislators to note the success of the abstinence message. "....[T]he implication for Congress of these facts is extremely clear--teens have responded to an unambiguous message on sexual abstinence."

According to the Physicians Consortium, the study will be "extremely controversial" because it contradicts previous research by the Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI)--the research arm of Planned Parenthood. AGI attributes the decline in teen pregnancy to contraceptive use.

Mohn calls Guttmacher’s assertions bad science. "Our research was much more sophisticated than all previous research on the subject," Mohn said. "We took into account important statistics on girls who are married as well as those who had not been sexually involved for more than a year."

Mohn said she sees a real cultural shift in the abstinence debate. "The cover of Newsweek magazine recently had a story featuring teen abstinence.... And the story was positive," Mohn said. "This study says it’s not just happening on paper, but it’s having a real impact on teen pregnancy."

The Door of Hope, one of 36 pregnancy care centers across Kentucky, has had an abstinence component in its program since 1995. Bowman estimates that 2000 kids in the Hopkins County area have heard the abstinence message this year.