GPs are to be encouraged to offer women a variety of contraceptive methods including injections and implants in an attempt to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies.
The Government will announce a scheme today aimed at ensuring that doctors advise young women not to opt automatically for an oral contraceptive and to think instead of alternative methods that last between three months and five years.
Evidence suggests that jabs and implants, which are prescribed to only 14 per cent of women seeking protection, are more reliable than the Pill, which is prescribed for about 35 per cent. Although the rate of teenage pregnancies in Britain has fallen from the peak years of the late 1990s, it is still the highest in Western Europe and the second highest, after the US, in the world.
In 2005 there were 39,804 conceptions by under18s in England, a rate of 41.3 per thousand.
More than 75 per cent forget to take their Pill on two or more consecutive days each month, increasing their chances of becoming pregnant.
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The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence backed the use of long-term contraceptives in a report two years ago which concluded that avoiding a greater proportion of unwanted pregnancies could save the NHS £100 million a year.
The Department of Health confirmed last night that, as part of the multi-million pound scheme to improve access to contraception, about £10 million would be used to encourage health authorities to “come up with new, innovative ways of improving contraception”.
Alternative methods include injections that need to be administered only every 12 weeks; a plastic tube implant that can last for up to three years; a coil, or intrauterine device, which is inserted into the womb and stops the fertilised egg implanting itself there; and an intrauterine system that releases a low dose of the hormone progestogen which prevents the fertilised egg from implanting and also makes it more difficult for the egg to be fertilised.
Dawn Primarolo, the Public Health Minister, is due to announce the scheme this morning.
A Department of Health spokes-woman said: “Ten regional health authorities will be asked to come up with proposals and, if agreed, they could be granted funding to run pilots.
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“Strategic health authoritiess will be required to ensure that any innovative piloting of condoms specifically targets young men as well as young women. All pilots will be required to focus on areas with high and increasing rates of teenage pregnancy.”