The Teen Pregnancy Pacts, What's So Shocking?

About 16 girls, around 16 years old were reported to be pregnant in Gloucester, and at least 50% of those became pregnant by choice or made a pact to bring up kids. So, what's shocking about it?

Teens getting pregnant is hardly news. What's startling is perhaps the number of pregnancies shot up 4 times (in just one school!), it's also about the pacts that the girls reportedly made, and that some of the girl's partners are in their 20s. And the school administration seems to be shocked over the welfare of these kids.

Ironically, everyone seems to be shocked except for the girls who made the choice. Remember that some of the girls even got depressed when they found they hadn't yet conceived. It seems that only now, the girls might be shocked because everyone around them seems to be. But there's a contention that the girls are too young to apprise the reality, aren't they? So is it enough reason this one, because one of the parents (father) expressed that he let it be, because he cared for his girl's happiness!

So what it is that's so shocking? Is it that some of the girl's partners, who're in their 20s may have committed “statuary rape.” Or that, it's now a long hard road ahead for the girls. Or that quadrupling of the number of pregnancies is startling (is just one school's stats representative of the whole country?). Or are they the public costs that can be saved by curbing teenage pregnancies. As for costs, teenage childbearing public costs were $120 billion from 1985 to 1990, and that $48 billion would have been saved if the pregnancies came about, if mothers were in their 20s.

Another aspect that surprises me is that on the one hand, there are people who who have to depend on pharmaceuticals called fertility drugs to conceive, and on the other there are the teenage pregnancies (which are for the most part undesirable). Different people seem to think differently. What do you think about it?