Authorities have warned of a worrying increase in teenage pregnancies in Taita Taveta county.
The latest statistics from the Health Information System reveal that 1,929 teens fell pregnant in the county between January and August 2021.
This is an increase from 1,428 cases recorded in 2020. The statistics further show the girls are aged between 12 and 16.
Youth, Gender and Social Services director Wallace Mwaluma said a collaborative approach and commitment are needed for partners to succeed in the fight against teen pregnancy.
Mwaluma said situations such as socioeconomic hardships, hunger and health crisis were the major contributing factors to the rise of teenage pregnancies.
“Poverty is majorly the big challenge now that livelihoods have been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. The matter should be tackled urgently,” he said during an interview in Voi on Sunday.
Statistics from the Taita Taveta Demographic Profile of 2021 by the National Council for Population and Development also show other 1,494 girls got pregnant between December 2019 and November 2020.
Mwaluma said they are aged between 15 and 19 years and the surge could be linked to the abrupt closure of schools due to Covid-19.
The cases, he said, could continue rising if stakeholders do not find a clear way to end sexual and gender-based violence.
He said the fight against SGBV has been derailed by parents who cooperate with culprits to settle the matter at home and marry off their pregnant girls.
“There are also cases of parents collaborating with their daughters and perpetrators to procure unsafe abortions in private clinics,” he added.
Last week, Mwaluma led other officials in a consultative meeting with religious leaders and youth groups to formulate a way of ending teen pregnancies.
According to county sexual and gender-based violence focal person Violet Mkamburi, the worrying surge in teenage pregnancies is an indication that more girls had dropped out of school compared to last year.
Mkamburi said building and sustaining community awareness on adolescent sexual and reproductive health should be prioritised in the campaign for teen pregnancy prevention.
“Raising awareness on puberty, sexual and reproductive health among teenagers should now be prioritised to counter the vice,” Mkamburi said.
Religious leaders in the region emphasised that their involvement should be considered as a strategic move in a campaign aimed at preventing teen pregnancies.
“Voluntary objective integration of various partners, including religious leaders, is very important in the campaign,” Liberty Christian Church Pastor Robert Mwangala said.
The pastors blamed the rising cases of teenage pregnancies on negligence by parents, accusing them of laxity and neglecting their responsibility of advising their children on the dangers of early sex.
Edited by EKibii
