The Department of Health and Human Services canceled 53 grants under the federal Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program in late June, ending roughly $68 million in funding two years before the awards were scheduled to expire.
Grantees in more than two dozen states received termination notices, according to Stateline, which reported the cancellations as 53 of 67 active awards. A congressional letter and other reporting have put the total at 66. The canceled list included universities, community organizations, city and state health departments and Planned Parenthood affiliates in states including Arizona, Montana, Michigan, Texas and West Virginia.
According to a list obtained by NPR, the stated reason was misalignment with agency priorities, specifically normalizing sexual activity for minors. Several organizations said the notices took effect immediately, leaving no time to wind down school partnerships already scheduled.
The program has run at roughly $101 million in annual grants since Congress established it in 2010, making the terminated awards a substantial share of one year's funding.
The Two Program Models Now in Play
Federal adolescent sexual health funding has long run through parallel streams built on different assumptions, and the change moves money between them.
The Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program funded interventions selected for having been evaluated and shown effects on measured outcomes. Programs under this model generally covered abstinence alongside contraception, condom use, healthy relationships and communication skills.
Sexual risk avoidance education, the successor terminology for abstinence education, operates on a different premise: that teaching young people to delay sexual activity is the intervention, and that programs should not present sexual activity as expected. The language accompanying the 2026 appropriations bill said grants for sexual risk avoidance must use medically accurate information and teach youth about risky behaviors without normalizing teen sexual activity.
Days before the terminations, the agency released new notices of funding opportunity. One, titled "Replicating Effective Teen Pregnancy Prevention Programs," will award a total of $63.4 million to 54 grantees. HHS said recipients must ensure curricula reflect what it called the immutable biological reality of sex and may not promote what it described as discriminatory equity ideology.
The Evidence on Each Approach
Both models have been evaluated, and the results are more mixed than either side's advocacy suggests.
Teen birth rates have fallen dramatically, declining roughly 72% since 2007 according to CDC data. Researchers attribute the decline to several factors operating together: more effective contraceptive methods, greater access to information, and a documented decline in adolescent sexual activity.
Disentangling how much any federal program contributed is genuinely difficult, because the decline is decades long, national, and coincided with changes no program controls.
On abstinence-focused programs specifically, the Guttmacher Institute reports that federal abstinence-only funding has not been shown to lower adolescent birth rates, and that states emphasizing abstinence-only approaches in policy have shown higher rates of adolescent pregnancies and births. Guttmacher advocates for comprehensive sex education, which readers should weigh when assessing its framing.
Proponents of sexual risk avoidance argue that comprehensive programs treat adolescent sexual activity as inevitable and displace parental authority, and that delaying first sexual activity is itself a health outcome worth pursuing.
What the terminations do not resolve is whether the replacement programs will produce different measured outcomes. That is an empirical question the new grant cycle has not yet answered.
The Legal and Political Response
The terminations have generated litigation and congressional pushback.
A July lawsuit was filed against HHS by two local governments, Planned Parenthood of the Heartland and the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. The complaint alleges the new funding notices require abstinence-only sexual risk avoidance content, require awardees to align with agency priorities on gender and diversity practices, and restrict discussion of teen sexual activity despite the program's statutory mandate to use medically accurate and age-appropriate interventions.
A federal judge separately blocked the agency directive on curricula following lawsuits from Planned Parenthood affiliates in California, Iowa and New York.
This is not the first attempt. During the first Trump administration in 2017, HHS ended grants for more than 80 recipients two years early. Democracy Forward sued on behalf of several grantees and won a permanent injunction after courts found the action violated agency regulations.
Rep. Kelly Morrison led colleagues in a letter demanding reinstatement, asking HHS to explain the rationale for each cancellation and to justify redirecting funding toward programs not previously authorized by Congress, with a response requested by July 10.
HHS has defended the shift as steering federal dollars toward abstinence-focused education, consistent with stated administration priorities.
The Services Adolescents Lose in the Interim
The immediate effect is on program availability rather than on any clinical service.
Terminated grantees operated in schools, community centers, health departments and Planned Parenthood affiliates, and the recipient list also included faith-affiliated organizations. Because terminations took effect immediately, several organizations said they had no opportunity to complete programming already scheduled with school partners.
Nothing in these terminations changes what a clinician may provide. Confidential adolescent reproductive health services, including contraception and STI testing, remain available through pediatricians, family physicians, Title X clinics, school-based health centers and federally qualified health centers, and most states allow minors to consent to STI testing and treatment without parental involvement. MedicalDaily has covered other shifts in preventive services and what coverage losses do locally.
Parents who want their children to receive information a school no longer provides can raise it with a pediatrician, who can discuss contraception, STI prevention and healthy relationships during an adolescent visit.
Key Questions Answered
What was cut? HHS canceled 53 Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program grants in late June, worth about $68 million, two years before they were set to expire. Sources differ on whether the program had 66 or 67 active awards.
Why were they canceled? According to a list obtained by NPR, the stated reason was misalignment with agency priorities, specifically normalizing sexual activity for minors.
What replaces them? A new funding opportunity titled "Replicating Effective Teen Pregnancy Prevention Programs" will award $63.4 million to 54 grantees, under criteria HHS says must reflect its position on biological sex and exclude equity-based content.
How do the two program models differ? The original program funded interventions evaluated for measured outcomes, generally covering abstinence alongside contraception and STI prevention. Sexual risk avoidance education focuses on delaying sexual activity without normalizing it.
What does the evidence show? Teen birth rates have fallen roughly 72% since 2007, driven by contraception, information access and declining adolescent sexual activity. Guttmacher, which advocates comprehensive education, reports abstinence-only funding has not been shown to lower birth rates.
Has this been challenged? Yes. Two local governments, Planned Parenthood of the Heartland and SIECUS sued in July, and a federal judge blocked a related curriculum directive. In 2017, similar terminations were reversed after courts found they violated agency regulations.
Does this change what a doctor can provide? No. Contraception, STI testing and confidential adolescent reproductive health services remain available through pediatricians, Title X clinics, school-based health centers and community health centers.
