Recent data from the Ghana Health Service District Health Information Management Health System (DHIMS) reveals that more than half a million teenagers are on record to have gotten pregnant over the last five years.
Between 2016 and 2020, about 555,575 teenagers aged 10 to 19 years, are said to have gotten pregnant. Within the five years, 13,444 teenagers between the ages of 10 and 14 got pregnant, while some 542,131 teenagers aged 15 to 19 years got pregnant. On average, a little over 112,800 teenagers get pregnant annually.
In spite of this, Newswatchgh.com is happy that trends from the DHIMS data indicate a reduction in the number of cases over the past five years.
In 2016, about 11.8 percent of pregnancies recorded in the country belonged to teenagers. In 2017, the number of cases increased to 11.9 percent out of the total number of registered pregnant women.
In 2018, the figure dropped to 11.7 percent, with no change being recorded in 2019. There was good news in 2020 as the country saw a marginal reduction to 11.2 percent. In our view, even though numbers in some regions decreased as the years went by, the figures are still alarming.
Considering these signs of progress, newswatchgh.com suggests that there must be continuous support in regional, district and community level engagements with other stakeholders to help reduce and prevent teenage pregnancies.
There must be engagement with the media to support the dissemination process to prevent teenage pregnancies. There is the need to use every platform to sensitize and encourage the community to send their children back to school.
In every Region of the world – including high-income countries – girls who are poor, poorly educated or living in rural areas are at greater risk of becoming pregnant than those who are wealthier, well-educated or urban.
It is a known fact that girls who lack choices and opportunities in life, or who have limited or no access to sexual and reproductive health care, are more likely to become pregnant.
It is sad that in this modern era, some girls are still being forced into child marriage, a violation of their human rights, hence leading them to become pregnant as teenagers.
In developing countries, nine out of 10 births to adolescent girls occur within a marriage or a union.
The major causes of adolescent pregnancy have been identified as poverty, gender inequality, child marriage, forced marriage, lack of education, power imbalances between adolescent girls and their male partners, and inadequate rights to prohibit such practices.
Newswatcgh.com advises parents to be more careful and play active roles in nurturing their children towards a better future, urging them to be responsible for the needs of their children especially girls so that they are not easily lured by men.
As a news agency, we also urge parents to assert their authority at home to guide their children to avoid temptations leading to unpleasant mishaps. We call on Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies to enact bye-laws to regulate the movement of children, especially at night.
As a reminder, when a girl becomes pregnant, her life can change radically. Her education may end and her job prospects diminish. She becomes more vulnerable to poverty and exclusion, and her health often suffers. Complications from pregnancy and childbirth are a leading cause of death among adolescent girls.
In our view, parents should therefore intensify sex education in order to expose the youth to dangers of early sex while we caution the youth against unwanted pregnancies since unmarried youth should not indulge in sex. They should also avoid abortion since it is a sin against God and Allah.
