A new study from the Centers for Disease Control concludes that a large number of teenage girls don’t know their chances of getting pregnant. In a survey of thousands of teenage mothers who had unintended pregnancies, one-third of the teenagers said they did not use birth control because they did not think they could get pregnant. While the CDC did not explore the specific reasons for the misconception, past studies have shown that teens thought they couldn’t get pregnant the first time they had sex, didn’t think they could get pregnant at that time of the month or thought they were sterile, according to the Associated Press.

About half of the 5,000 mothers surveyed said they were not using any form of birth control. Officials told the AP that the survey’s results highlight a lack of knowledge that puts teens at risk:

“This report underscores how much misperception, ambivalence and magical thinking put teens at risk for unintended pregnancy,” said Bill Albert, a spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.

Other studies have asked teens about their contraception use and beliefs about pregnancy. But the CDC report released Thursday is the first to focus on teens who didn’t want to get pregnant but did. [...]

“I think what surprised us was the extent that they were not using contraception,” said Lorrie Gavin, a CDC senior scientist who co-authored the report.

Of the teen moms who said they were using contraception, almost 20 percent said they used the pill or a birth control patch, and 24 percent said they used condoms. CDC officials said they think the teenagers failed to use contraception correctly or consistently. For most, it was not an issue of access; only 13 percent said they did not use birth control because they had trouble accessing it.

Additionally, about a quarter of teens surveyed said they did not use contraception because their partner did not want them to. In response, Albert suggested that sex education needs to be expanded beyond information about anatomy and birth control to include advice on how to deal with a situation in which a girl is pressured to do something she doesn’t want to.

Albert told the AP that the findings are sobering, but pointed out that teen birth rates hit the lowest point in 70 years. Instead of leading people to the conclusion that teenagers can’t figure out birth control, he said it shows that “[m]ost of them are figuring it out.”

Earlier this month, a coalition of health and education groups released new non-binding guidelines about what should be included in sex education classes so that schools would have minimum standards to follow. They recommended that curricula be more comprehensive and start as early as second grade, and that by the time students leave eighth grade, they should be able to evaluate the effectiveness of abstinence, condoms, and birth control bills. Under the Obama administration, federal funding has shifted from abstinence education to teen pregnancy prevention programs.

Highly restrictive abortion laws do not lead to lower abortion rates, according to a new report from the Guttmacher Institute. Globally, nations that have more restrictive abortion laws, like in Latin American and Africa, also see a higher number of unsafe abortions and deaths because of the unsafe procedures.

The chart below compares regional abortion rates to abortion policies and shows that women living under Western Europe’s liberal laws undergo fewer abortions than those in more restrictive countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia:

Additionally, while the worldwide abortion rate has dropped between 1995 and 2003, it stalled between 2003 and 2008. And nearly half of all abortions are unsafe. And the proportion of abortions that take place in the developing world, where 56 percent of unsafe abortions take place, increased between 1995 and 2008, from 78 percent to 86 percent because of the population growth in these countries.

Gilda Sedgh, a senior research associate that the Guttmacher Institute, said the increase was “cause for concern.” “The long-term decline in global abortion rates has stalled, at the same time that abortions are becoming concentrated in developing countries,” Sedgh said in a statement. “This plateau coincides with a slowdown in contraceptive uptake. Without greater investment in quality family planning services, we can expect the plateau to persist.” An estimated 47,000 women die from unsafe abortions each year, making up 13 percent of maternal deaths.

Despite these findings, the GOP presidential candidates pledged to restrict women’s access to both abortions and contraception during a pro-life presidential forum last night. Frontrunner Mitt Romney, who was not at the forum, has flirted with supporting a “personhood amendment” and has promised to adopt policies that restrict the availability of abortion coverage

Our guest bloggers are Katy Womble and Kasey Mckeral, interns at the Center for American Progress.

Yesterday, the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured released their annual report outlining trends in Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) eligibility, enrollment, renewal, and cost-sharing policies in all fifty states. As families continue to struggle in a weak economy, Medicaid and CHIP remain essential sources of healthcare coverage for children.

The report demonstrates that the number of uninsured children dropped to 8 percent in 2010 (the lowest uninsured rate for children since the federal government began tracking this statistic in 1987), even as a slow economic recovery meant lower access to employer-based coverage. The ACA requirement for states to maintain eligibility levels and enrollment procedures was essential in Medicaid and CHIP coverage levels remaining stable. States also relied on the Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2009 (CHIPRA) to adopt new technologies that streamlined the enrollment process and increased workloads the accompanied higher enrollments. Using the bonuses included in CHIRA, states adopted tools like express lane eligibility, SSA Data Match to verify citizenship, and simplified renewal options.

As Medicaid programs expand coverage, however, communities must find new ways to reach out to eligible people and to deal with the increasing number, and cost, of Medicaid participants. Partnerships between state and community-based organizations have helped Massachusetts achieve a 99.5% coverage rate for eligible children. Bottom-up approaches like recruitment tables at churches, malls, schools, and ads in local ethnic media sources have helped states like Massachusetts push enrollment rates to the highest levels in the nation. Community outreach strategies have been particularly valuable in Massachusetts, precisely because the state has expanded the income eligibility threshold to allow families to enroll in Medicaid even if they do not fall below the federal poverty line ($18,530 per year).

Overall, states have expanded eligibility requirements and enrollment, but more work needs to be done on improving retention and utilization of Medicaid and CHIP services. Income disparities still exist between states when it comes to the threshold for providing Medicaid and CHIP coverage. Seventeen states only authorize Medicaid eligibility if a family of three has an income of $9,265 or below. In contrast, the CHIP programs in states like Massachusetts have a lower threshold for eligibility ($37,060 per year), helping to protect low and moderate income children even during a recession. Beginning in 2014, the Affordable Care Act will address these disparities by harmonizing the income threshold at 138 percent of the federal poverty level. In the future, we expect to see administrative and cultural changes that will strengthen coverage and prepare communities for anticipated reforms.

New Gingrich pledges to repeal the Affordable Care Act on “day one”, but has also publicly praised several of its provisions — including the requirement that insurers allow young adults to remain on their parents’ health care plans. “There are clearly things that we’d like to see continued and we’d like to see legislation passed almost concurrently that will sustain the good parts,” Gingrich told corporate clients while working for his health care think tank. He expanded on the theme during a campaign stop in New Hampshire last year, specifically identifying the young adults provision as something he would like to maintain. “That particular piece there is nothing wrong with. I didn’t say there is anything wrong with that. I’m happy to concede out of 2,800 pages, at least 200 are good.”

But during a town hall in South Carolina this morning, the former House speaker tried to play to the Republican crowd and ridiculed the young adult provision:

GINGRICH: Obama would like you to be on your parents’ insurance until your 26. I would like for you to have a job, so you can be on your own insurance. You know, you decide which is a better future.

Watch it:

Recent data found that 2.5 million young adults who either lost insurance from their employer or were previously uninsured now have coverage as a result of the provision. In fact, if Gingrich would honestly considers the rest of the law, he would find many more provisions he could agree with.

One year ago today, after just seven hours of debate, the House Republicans repealed the Affordable Care Act, promising to direct key committees to draw up their own legislation to replace the Democratic blueprint and find a way to restore health care coverage to 32 million Americans. “This majority is dedicated to growth for the American people. Repealing last year’s health-care law is a critical step,” Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) said in closing remarks, after the measure passed in a vote of 245 to 189. The next step, replacing the law, begins “an honest debate about a better way forward,” Cantor promised.

But that debate never came. Instead, Republicans held numerous hearings to water down various parts of the law, from eliminating the already defunct long-term care program to questioning regulations that aim to control insurer profits (by requiring companies to spend 80 to 85 percent of premium dollars providing health care services). The repeal legislation stalled in the Senate, but had it passed, millions of young adults would find themselves without health insurance, seniors would continue to fall into the Medicare prescription doughnut hole, small businesses would lose tax credits and grants for providing health insurance coverage, and insurers could still rescind coverage or deny it on the basis of pre-existing conditions. The repeal bill also increased the deficit by billions of dollars and allowed health care spending to rise at an unsustainable rate.

Before the final vote, the Democrats unsuccessfully offered a motion to recommit that would have prevented the law from being repealed unless a majority of members gave up their own government-sponsored health coverage, which, like the ACA, can be purchased through a government-regulated exchange of private health insurers who cannot discriminate against sicker people. At the time of the vote, only nine Republicans said that they would opt out of the taxpayer-subsidized Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan (FEHBP). The overwhelming majority voted to significantly limit access to health care for millions of Americans, while continuing to receive their own well-regulated government financed benefits.

In the year since the vote, however, the health care industry and the reddest of red states have made peace with the law and have begun to implement various parts of the measure. Health insurers, for instance, who were once the strongest political opponents of the reform, are huddling with Republican governors to plot strategy for building the exchanges. The Chamber of Commerce is no longer calling for outright repeal and 28 states and the District of Columbia “are on their way toward establishing their own Affordable Insurance Exchange,” having received three rounds of grants from the federal government to set up the new regulated marketplaces where small businesses and individuals will be able to compare and shop for comprehensive insurance beginning in 2014. That, to borrow Cantor’s words, seems to be the “better way forward.”