The United Nations’ sexual and reproductive well being company on Thursday urged complete sexuality schooling for learners aged 5 to 19 within the Philippines as quickly as attainable, to stem pregnancies amongst women as younger as 10.
Dr. Leila Joudane, the Country Representative of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) within the Philippines, made the decision throughout a House youth and sports activities improvement committee listening to on measures to determine a nationwide coverage to forestall adolescent pregnancies and institutionalize social protections for teenage mother and father.
“The Philippines still has one of the highest adolescent birth rates among major economies in the Southeast Asian region. We need to recognize this, and this is a concerning trend because 59% of the adolescent births were fathered by an adult male aged 20 years old and above,” Joudane instructed lawmakers.
Joudane’s feedback stemmed from Philippine authorities knowledge displaying that there have been at the very least 2,000 pregnancies amongst Filipinos aged 10 to 14 within the interval from 2020 to 2022—a troubling statistic that negates the discount in pregnancies amongst 15- to 19-year-olds to five.4% in 2022 from 8.5% in 2017.
“While the number of total adolescent childbirths is declining, the number of child births by mothers aged between 10 to 14 years old have shown a slight increase. Our number one recommendation is to accelerate the provision of comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) on children and adolescents,” she added.
The UNFPA official stated that primarily based on Philippine authorities information, just one.1 million learners have been capable of obtain CSE as of January 2023.
“These 1.1 million learners only account for 3.4% of 32 million learners aged five to 19 who need to have access to CSE now,” Joudane pressured.
“We need to accelerate the provision of CSE for all children, without discrimination,” she added.
Joudane stated there’s additionally a necessity to make sure that adolescents have better accessibility to sexual and reproductive well being companies, together with household planning and contraceptives, even with out parental consent.
She stated that the nation’s current legal guidelines on testing for HIV permits adolescents to entry testing with out parental or a guardian’s consent, a coverage that may be replicated for sexual and reproductive well being companies, together with household planning and contraceptives.
“From government data, the unmet need for family planning is 27.9% among young women aged 15 to 19, higher than the national average of 16.7%. This shows that adolescents aged 15 to 19 are in need of family planning, are requesting for family planning, but cannot have access to family planning,” she identified.
This interprets to a maternal mortality charge of 102 per 100,000 reside births within the 15–19 age group, she added.
“This mortality rate among 15- to 19-year-olds is contributing to the country’s high maternal mortality rate,” she stated.
“Based on data, lowering the age when one can receive sexual and reproductive health services, including family planning without parental consent, starting at 15 years old will make a significant difference,” she stated.
“We need an adolescent-friendly environment so they can find help and have proper information on how to protect themselves from unintended pregnancies and, if they are already pregnant, to prevent repeated pregnancy [at a young age],” she added.
Joudane additionally famous that world analysis confirmed that elevated entry to contraceptives doesn’t make adolescents have interaction in intercourse greater than they need to.
“Globally, there is no evidence that increased access to contraceptives makes adolescents more sexually active. Global research has in fact proven that abstinence as the only approach is not effective, and abstinence combined with sexual education wherein they would have proper access to information about contraceptive use is more successful,” she stated.
“That is why it is important to accelerate the CSE so that adolescents will have the correct information which would allow them to have informed and responsible decisions,” she added.
In addition, the UNFPA official stated there also needs to be applications targeted on males and younger boys, in addition to alloting 10% of funds for the youth councils in addressing teenage pregnancies.
Albay Representative Edcel Lagman, one of many principal authors of the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health regulation, backed Joudane in pushing for the pending House payments geared toward lowering, if not eradicating teenage being pregnant.
“Adolescent mothers should be fixtures of the past. But until today, teenage mothers still abound. Let me also emphasize that the highest rate of maternal mortality is accounted for by adolescent pregnancies and childbirths,” Lagman stated.
“All of the seven bills address the serious problem of adolescent pregnancy which has been documented as a national social emergency,” Lagman added. — BM, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
