Uncontrolled teenage pregnancy at Kwatire and Adentia is a major problem of parents in the predominantly farming communities in the Sunyani West District, Mr Martin Gyan, Assemblyman for Kwatire, said on Friday.
The situation, he explained, had brought additional economic burden on them, as parents in the area, engaged in subsistent farming had cater for their pregnant daughters after child birth.
According to the assemblyman, boys who impregnated most of the teenagers were their unemployed counterparts, and they could not provide for their upkeep.
Speaking to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview, after a separate forum on sexual reproductive health care and unsafe abortion at the farming communities, Mr Gyan emphasized that outmoded cultural practices that restricted sex education among teenagers ought to be stopped.
The assemblyman said the situation was as a result of lack of sexual education among teenagers in the area.
Global Media Foundation (GLOMEF), a human right and media advocacy Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) organized the forum, which is in line with a project the NGO is implementing in parts of Brong-Ahafo Region.
The three-year project, being funded by the Safe Abortion Fund, is aimed at helping young girls to easily access safe abortion services as well as family planning methods.
Mr Gyan noted with concern that sex education was very low and because most of them could not control their sexual desire, they easily get pregnant.
He said some of the pregnant girls attempted to abort by applying herbs and other concoctions and they end up in various health complications.
Mrs Doris Kyeremaah Yeboah, a Community Health Nurse at the Sunyani West District Directorate of Health observed that teenage pregnancy was rife in the area.
She advised girls in the district to opt for family planning services to protect themselves against pregnancy.
Mr Raphael Godlove Ahenu, Chief Executive Officer of GLOMEF, reiterated the need to integrate sexual reproductive health care in basic school curricula.
He noted that girls between 14 and 16 years were very sexually active and it was not appropriate that they were denied basic sex education.
Mr Ahenu stressed that as adolescent girls went through several characteristics, there was the need for parents to endeavour to provide them with basic needs for their upkeep.
Source: GhanaWeb
