State and federal cutbacks in funding for family planning services, increases in abstinence only funding and lack of access to abortion is fostering a baby boomlet in the U.S. The 4.3 million births reported in the U.S. in 2006 is the largest number since 1961. A report released last month by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics reflects that that the 2006 birth rate exceeded the replacement rate for the first time since 1971 reports the Daily Women’s Health Policy Report.
An Associated Press analysis of the birth rate globally reflects that the U.S. birth rate is higher than ‘every country in continental Europe, as well as Australia, Canada and Japan.
“Right wing forces combined with the power of the Catholic Hierarchy in U.S. politics has led to dramatic cutbacks in constant dollars in family planning funding, abortion access, and a skyrocketing of federal funding for ineffective abstinence only programs,” reflected Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation. “Some thirty-states as well as the federal government have made in constant dollars major cutbacks in family planning services.”
