The Kadjebi District Girls’ Education Officer of the Ghana Education Service (GES), Ms Emma Asilevi, has advised schoolgirls to abstain from premarital sex.
She said premarital sex had many damaging effects like emotional, psychological and physical problems resulting from the health challenges such as Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) including HIV and AIDS, teenage pregnancy and abortions, that were likely to be its outcome, with the tendency to truncate their future.
Ms Asilevi gave this advice when addressing Students of the Kadjebi-Asato Senior High School (KASEC) on the causes and effects of teenage pregnancy in the Oti Region.
She later told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview that her visit to the school was to address the girls based on the many reported cases of pregnant candidates sitting for the 2023 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) in the district.
She said during the 2023 WASSCE, nine pregnant candidates sat for the examination as against the eight and two nursing mothers recorded in 2022.
Again, at the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) level, out of the 689 female candidates who sat for the examination in the district in 2023, nine were pregnant, with 16 others nursing babies, compared to the one and three cases respectively recorded out of the 561 females who sat for the exams in 2022.
She identified parental neglect, moral weaknesses, ignorance and curiosity, as some of the causes of premarital and early sex and appealed to parents to be more responsible for the general upbringing of their female children.
The Girls’ Education Officer said there were plans to visit other schools like the Ahamansu Islamic Senior High School (SHS) and Dodi-Papase Senior High Technical School, in the locality for a similar engagement.
Ms Asilevi said the engagement would be extended to the Churches and Mosques for them to help reduce the trend in the district.
Mr Stephen Amoah, a Public Health Officer, who accompanied her on the visit, warned that early pregnancy in young teenage girls could lead to obstetric fistula and other complications, especially in the absence of skilled birth attendants and emergency obstetric care.
He advised the girls against engaging in early sex by observing total abstinence or the use of condoms as a preventive measure.
GNA
MA/CAA/CA
01 March 2024
Pic attached
