Teen pregnancy
Teen Pregnancy is a serious problem in many countries, and affects high, middle, and low-income countries, although it's higher in those with a lack of education, poverty, and job opportunities. There could be many reasons why the rank of teen pregnancy is high, for example, lack of sexual education, could be from actual information of how the act works and the use of anticonvective, or lack of awareness about the effects and responsibility of raising a child on early age. The prevalence of a culture that constantly encourages uncontrolled sexual satisfaction and enjoyment in young people is considered another catalyzing factor. In today’s digital age, easy and instant access to millions of data on any topic is beneficial, but harmful at the same time since it favors access to pornographic material. Now going to focus on my home country, Guatemala; which has a high rate of child pregnancy and early age marriage, some of the reasons why for this are lack of education and cultural differences.
Education: Guatemala is not strong in education, not on basic knowledge but also sexual education, some say “that education must come from home’’ but many parents do not want to have that talk with their children because they believe is ‘’uncomfortable’’ or ‘’inappropriate’’ for them, but it must the settle that the children must have this either at home or in their educational center (or both). The promotion of sexual education must spread among parents for them to avoid an undesired pregnancy.
Educational centers, public or private should also be able to teach this and should have the initiative to do so. Often centers avoid this topic or handle it wrong because again, the taboo of sexual education is inappropriate. Many centers in Guatemala had meetings with their students, about mental health, and the use of drugs, but no meeting about sexual education, so why is it that those other topics are being spread among the children and not sex, a human act? At some point in 2022, Guatemala wanted to even ban sexual education, this would’ve been a protection of family law which doesn’t do any good.
Cultural: In Guatemala, the latest official statistics are from 2009, the year in which it was recorded that 7.7% of girls between 15 and 19 years old were married (Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance, National Institute of Statistics, Center for Disease Control (2010). National Maternal and Child Health Survey 2008–2009. Guatemala: Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance). Latin America, has the 2nd rate of highest teen pregnancy. This practice of marriage of the young is forbidden but continued, with teens and girls being traded and then left pregnant. Remember this has a huge impact because of these girls being mothers they only work on, and they cannot continue to enjoy their youth, including finishing their studies.
A possible solution for both of these problems is to raise awareness and promote education about how to prevent teen pregnancies, the use of condoms and how and where to access them, the appropriate age to have this type of relationship, the impacts it has on your body, either just having sex or developing and giving birth to a baby. The huge responsibility that it is to take care of a baby and how this may pause your life to continue the one of the children.
