Revere kids now able to get condoms at high school

REVERE – Students enrolled in the high school health center will be able to obtain condoms and other birth control with parental permission under a new School Committee policy.Under the policy, health center enrollment forms will be revised to include a parental checkoff for contraceptive distribution. School Superintendent Paul Dakin said the first solid indicator of parental views on the checkoff will come in late summer when parents enroll or reenroll children for the 2009-2010 school year.About 400 students are enrolled in the high school-based center.School Committee members split over the so-called “parental opt-out” proposal in voting last month to approve it. Mayor Thomas Ambrosino, Carol Tye, Daniel Maguire and Donna Wood Pruitt voted for the proposal while Michael Ferrante and Ann Raponi voted against it.”I couldn’t vote ‘yes’ in good conscience,” said Raponi, adding, “This program, voluntary or not, tends to increase promiscuity: it’s almost like condoning early sex. Money is better spent on talking to these kids about understanding consequences.”Dakin said those types of conversations do occur between health workers, counselors and students but stressed that state “emancipated minor” laws provided broad latitude for teen access to birth control. He stressed that condoms and other birth control are not currently distributed at the health center and said the enrollment form checkoff will give parents choices.”Most parents might say, ‘I don’t want that,'” he said.He said the opt out proposal was the product of discussions between local health professionals and educators.The committee’s approval of opt-out coincides with the release last month of state public health statistics showing a sharp increase in Revere’s teen birth rate. The rate for 2007, according to a Massachusetts Teen Pregnancy Alliance review of the statistics, was 45.6 per 1,000 or 48 births.In 2006, Revere’s rate was 37 per 1,000 with 39 births. The 23 percent increase in the rate ranks Revere 12th among Massachusetts communities. The statistics cover females ages 15 to 19 years old.”It behooves us to look at ways to reduce the pregnancy rate,” Dakin said.