The Federal Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program serves more than 300,000 young people.
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The Trump administration is telling the organizations working to prevent teenage pregnancy that they must stop teaching content that doesn’t match the administration’s views on transgender people and parental rights, or they risk losing federal funds.
Seventy-three organizations, including local health departments, community groups and universities, receive a portion of the $101 million budget for their teen pregnancy prevention program each year. The group serves more than 300,000 young people, primarily in school settings.
“This is a change in the earthquake,” said Adrian Shanker, former deputy secretary to health policy under President Joe Biden. “This should be a universally highly regarded goal, as it is an effective program to keep teens from getting pregnant across the country.”
The Department of Health and Human Services policy was published in a note to recipients in a July 1 memo, banning programs that provide grants to teach heterosexuals about sex not vaginal intercourse. It also prohibits the “eroticization of birth control methods” and prohibits content about creating more enjoyable sexual experiences.
This policy prohibits discussion among young people experiencing gender discomfort or expressing their transgender identity.
“The Act does not require, endorse or allow minors to teach (ideological) content that includes radical ideological claims that boys can identify as girls,” says the memo granting the winner. “The programme should aim to reduce teenage pregnancies without teaching the content of such ideology.”
Public health experts say the move could further denounce LGBTQ+ youth who have higher rates of teenage pregnancy than their heterosexual peers, and often feel uncomfortably uncomfort to talk to parents and healthcare providers about sex.
In a statement, Emily Hilliard, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services, said the new policy “will ensure that taxpayer dollars “no longer support taxpayer dollars from undermining custody, promoting fundamental gender ideology, or being exposed to sexually explicit material under the banner of public health.”
Corina T. Lelutiu-Weinberger, an associate professor of health science research at Columbia University in New York, said that teen pregnancy rates are already disproportionately high among bisexual girls, making it difficult to talk about sexual behavior.
A 2018 study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that bisexual girls were “almost five times more risky than teenage pregnancy, and those identified as almost heterosexual or lesbians were about twice as risky as teenagers who were completely heterosexual.” Most of the disparities were explained by physical, emotional, or sexual abuse.
Lelutiu-Weinberger said young people tend to understand only their sexuality, as they don’t want to talk about it with their parents. She said LGBTQ+ people also tend to struggle to talk about sex with healthcare providers who may not be used to talking about sex or may have biased themselves.
“There’s a lot of discomfort and misunderstanding, and there’s often no conversation,” Lelutiu-Weinberger said. “And it’s uncomfortable for both parties to raise it for fear of stigma.”
Amelia Stanton, a professor at Boston University and a researcher in the Sexual, Reproductive and Mental Disorder Disorder Program, said the change would not coincide with science or promote the greatest benefits of public health.
“If we’re restricting that information, we’re not providing any tools for planning,” Stanton said. “We don’t offer the opportunity to actually learn how to prevent STIs or have a sexual activity agency.”
Stanton said that heterosexual sex could be more consistent with traditional values, but he cannot teach children about oral sex, anal sex and other sexual behaviors that take the risk of sexually transmitted diseases.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, almost half of the countries with chlamydia, go disease and syphilis were reported in 15-24 cases in 2023. Infectious diseases are disproportionately high among men who have had sex with men.
Shanker, a former Biden aide, said Congress created a teenage pregnancy prevention program under President Barack Obama in 2010 and implemented an abstinence-only sex education model under President George W. Bush.
“We have a very effective, comprehensive program that is tinkering around for political purposes rather than trying to achieve public health outcomes for Americans,” Shanker said.
