Alarming rise in Tonota teenage pregnancies

Pini Bothoko | Tuesday March 11, 2014 15:53

 

Senior council secretary, Terrence Ntalabgwe, said during his presentation of the District Development Committee (DDC) report recently that from July to December last year, 111 teenage pregnancies were recorded in the 15-19 age group.

From July to September 2013, there were 56 teenage pregnancies while October to December recorded 55 cases. “This is a sad situation. Imagine in a year, over 100 teenagers fall pregnant and amongst them are school going children whose learning will be disrupted,” Ntalabwe said. He stated that Borolong Health Post registered 11 cases of teenage pregnancy from July to September.

Gojwane, Mabesekwa, Manyanda health posts and Tonota College of Education (TCE) recorded two cases each. Madisakwana Health Post had eight cases while Mandunyane, Shashe and Tlhalogang health posts recorded three cases each. Ntalabwe said that there was one case of an under-15 girl falling pregnant at Tlhalogang Health Post last year. He lamented that the pregnancies are increasing though they have distributed free condoms to control the problem. “We do not know what could be the problem as teenage pregnancies continue rising.

In the first quarter of 2013 we distributed 95,305 male condoms at Tonota Clinic, 3,000 at Tlhalogang Health Post, 500 to Borolong health post and 4,460 at Dimotswe mobile stop as an encouragement for people to practice safe sex.  We increased the number of condoms at Borolong Health Post - 14,000 male condoms and 60 female condoms - in the last quarter of October to December,” explained Ntalabgwe. The figure for Tonota Clinic has hit 103,780 male condoms and 1,912 female condoms in a quarter while Tlhalogang stock was boosted to  8,463 male condoms from 3,000.

Meanwhile, one of the councillors applauded the council for its extensive condom distribution that reaches cattle posts and lands in the sub-district.

Nominated councillor, Motlhware Bogatsu said that it was a good idea that condoms were distributed at cattle posts and other remote settlements. 

Last year during a visit to Borolong, the Minister of Education and Skills Development (MoESD), Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi said she was concerned by the high number of teens dropping out of schools because of pregnancy. She pleaded with parents to talk to their children to desist from engaging in sex at a young age. “Learn to be open to your children, discuss with them issues of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases and tell them to wait for the right time to start dating. It worries me because most of the time, these children are impregnated by men in the community not their fellow students,” Venson-Moitoi said then.