No fewer than fifteen (15) female students of St. Mary’s Girls Senior High School at Konongo in the Ashanti Region are reportedly pregnant currently.
According to United Television (UTV) news, four (4) of the pregnant students are in their final year, ten (10) are in their second year and one (1) is a first-year student.
Headmistress of the school, Alice Martha Adjei reportedly confirmed the development and lamented that it has put her outfit in a tight corner because she cannot expel the students because of their pregnancy.
Authorities of the school are said to be disturbed about the increase in teenage pregnancy among female students of the school, which distorts their education.
They are worried that if steps are not taken to address the trend of teenage pregnancy in the school, the future of teenage girls would be in danger. Most of the students are not able to return to continue their education after childbirth, and even when they do, their attention is between studies and caring for the child.
Alice Martha Adjei cautioned against grown men taking advantage of female students and getting them pregnant and destroying their future.
Relatedly, about 21 abortions were committed by teenagers in the year 2022, with the Ashanti Region leading, followed by the Eastern Region.
The frightening development came to light following data released by the Ghana Health Service (GHS).
According to the data, 7,618 recorded abortions were recorded among teenage girls in 2022, translating into about 21 abortions each day of the year.
Last year’s figure is a decrease of 10% from that of the 2021 figure of 8,465, the GHS said.
Collectively, the years 2020, 2021 and 2022 recorded a total number of 24,108 abortions among teenage girls, with the average for the three years being 8,036 abortions among teenagers translating to 22 abortions per day and about an abortion every hour of the day.
The Ashanti Region which appears to have gained notoriety in recording high abortion cases has again recorded the highest number of teenage abortions in 2022 with a total of 1,275.
The region recorded 1,407 and 1,531 teenage abortions in 2020 and 2021 respectively.
It is followed by the Eastern Region which recorded 1,106 abortion cases, while the Ahafo Region recorded the lowest number of teenage abortions with a total of 171 abortions in 2022, the data shows.
No wonder a model of estimates for pregnancies and abortions released in the first quarter of 2022 showed that some 266,000 abortions were done in Ghana within four years.
The Guttmacher Institute, the World Health Organisation and the UN’s Human Reproduction Programme (HRP) released the first-ever model-based estimates of unintended pregnancy and abortion rates for 150 countries, highlighting major disparities in access to sexual and reproductive health care.
The study analyses rates from 2015 to 2019, with the aim of providing deeper insights into access to sexual and reproductive health services in countries of all income levels across the globe.