Policy approaches to Latina teen pregnancy: Expanding the framework to advance adolescent sexual and reproductive health

Existing policy approaches to Latina adolescent sexual and reproductive health focus largely on funding state- and community-level teen pregnancy prevention programs. Focusing on teen pregnancy prevention as the main strategy to advancing Latina adolescent sexual and reproductive health is a limited framework for doing so because so many of those needs fall outside of the scope of pregnancy prevention. This presentation will provide an analysis of the strengths and limitations of current policies meant to impact Latina adolescent sexual and reproductive health, and propose policy approaches that utilize a reproductive justice framework to address fundamental causes of inequity that produce disproportionately high teen birth rates among Latinas, like poverty, racial and ethnic discrimination and low health insurance rates, that put Latinas at risk for poor health outcomes.