The D.C. children’s health crisis and how to correct it
Published: October 13, 2009
Updated: October 13, 2009
A recent Rand Corporation study said the 100,000 children in the Nation’s Capitol have the best healthcare coverage in the nation, with only 3.5 percent uninsured, versus 9.1 percent for children nationally.
But healthcare coverage alone does not insure a good life or good health for children.
The District’s infant mortality rate is double the national average.
The D.C. child abuse/neglect rate is also twice the national average.
Thirteen percent of District children have sex before age 13, which is nearly double the national rate of 7 percent.
Among D.C. girls younger than 15, the pregnancy rate is twice the national average, and their abortion rate is also more than double, with one of every two pregnancies ending in an abortion. For the older D.C. teens, one of every three pregnancies are aborted.
Almost 13 percent of D.C. children in grades 6–8 report having three or more sexual partners, and 20 percent of teens in grades 9–12 had four or more partners.
It is no surprise then that the children’s chlamydia and gonorrhea rates are nearly three times the national average. The syphilis rate for 10 to 14 year-olds in D.C. is forty times the national average!
Those early sexuality problems contribute to a rate of dating violence in the District nearly double the national average.
District teens also use heroin and other injection drugs at double the national rate.
Predictably, the District has the nation’s highest rate of new AIDS cases, and D.C.’s mortality rate from AIDS is also nearly ten times the national rate.
With D.C.’s per pupil expenditure of $11,193 (13th highest in the nation), education should be a child’s ladder up and out, but D.C’s 57.6 percent high school graduation rate is far below the national average of 70.6 percent.
At triple the national rate, District children reported that they skipped school in the past 30 days because they felt unsafe at school.
During the same time period, whether as a cause or an effect, one in every five children in D.C. had carried a weapon, and one in every thirteen had taken a weapon to school.
Schoolchildren did not feel safe even though the District is probably the most heavily policed jurisdiction in the world. From a population perspective, D.C. has one full-time armed local or federal law enforcement officer for every 42 District residents. Geographically, there is one officer for every 2.88 acres in the District.
Only slightly more children live in poverty in the District (23 percent) than is seen nationally (18 percent), so poverty alone cannot be blamed for D.C. children’s significantly worse quality of life.
The Rand study’s statistics provide the answer: Nearly 60 percent of all children in D.C. live in single-parent homes, and another 13 percent are in a grandparent’s custody. Both of those rates are double the national average. The amount of D.C. children in juvenile detention is also double, and the rate of children in foster care is nearly four times the national average. When those institutionalized children are factored in, less than one-quarter of the children in the District live in a two-parent family.
The most likely cure for the District’s children does not require a new bureaucracy or more federal funds. The children need and deserve what every child wants — an intact family with a committed mom and a committed dad, starting life together and staying together.
Sharman’s column appears each Tuesday.
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Reader Reactions
rjma - My family visited the Capitol, located in our nation’s Capital, last year and we didn’t see anywhere NEAR 100,000 children in there.
Maybe they were hiding in the HVAC ducts?
Mr. Sharman is brilliant!! What a simple solution! Just have an “intact family with a committed mommy & a committed daddy” and this will “correct it”. All will be right with the world. Kids won’t be abused, kids won’t use drugs, kids won’t have underage sex, kids won’t be exposed to violence…wow,tell us more, Mr. Sharman!
Correct “Former resident”, the problems exist despite the money spent there, cause money thrown at the wall of immorality doesn’t stick. It won’t cure any moral problem.
But that doesn’t mean that we should not be offered a public option for health care insurance.
It’s time Congress stands up for the average Americans and against big insurance companies. Our representatives in Washington need to pass real health care reforms that makes affordable coverage available to the millions of middle class families that are one illness away from financial ruin.
This includes a public option which would hold insurance companies accountable, and would keep costs down for everyone. No one should go broke taking care of a loved one. Congress must pass health care reform with a public option.
I urge all of you who believe this to be true, to write a handwritten letter to Sen. Warner, and let him know. If you want to make a big impact with it, like we are, handwrite it and mail it to:
Phil Olafsen
2104 E. Main St.
Richmond VA 23223
He is going to roll each one up, tie a ribbon around each, and hand deliver them to Sen. Warner’s office soon. So please do so ASAP.
Wed. Oct. 14th would be a good day to call Sen. Warner’s office as well, and let him know.
The headline is pretty misleading. Where is the “how to correct” it part? Or does Sharman have a magic plan bring about two-parent families in DC that he will reveal in the next episode of this column?
The way I read it, the writer implies that these pervasive problems in the District exist despite the amount of money spent there on health care and education, not because of it.
100,000 children live in the Nation’s Capitol? Must get mighty tight even in that big building.
I completely agree with Mr. Sharman that there are a lot of problems associated with the “lack of intact” families. But Sharman tries to blame these problems on the fact that the kids have good access to health care or that education in cities is more expensive than in states.
Without good access to health care or reducing the spending on education, most of these problems he cites would likely be worse.
I win. It was single mommies.
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