adminCatherine Murombedzi HIV
THERE have been many times we hear a woman saying she did not get pregnant by intention. Her having intercourse was not meant to result in a pregnancy. This pregnancy therefore is unplanned and at times even unwanted.
These are sobering thoughts indeed. Why would someone get pregnant and not want it. Was there a lack of information and contraception to use as a barrier to falling pregnant?
Globally adolescent girls in low and middle income countries continue to face unmet needs when it comes to their sexual reproductive health, this was said by a report by Guttmacher Institute of Germany.
Two thirds of sexually active adolescent women do not have access to contraceptives. This unmet need then contributes to higher risks of HIV, unintended pregnancies leading to unsafe back yard abortions.
The report noted that 95 percent of the 13 million births globally among young women aged 15-19 annually, thereby making access to contraception an issue to be taken high on agendas.
If poverty has to be lowered, then these women’s reproductive health rights have to be met. Babies born to adolescent girls face higher risks of low birth weight, malformations, tough environment to grow up in and risk a host of other complications.
Aids related deaths among young women aged between 15 and 19 are on the increase and the majority being found in sub-Saharan Africa.
“This increase likely reflects a lack of commitment to providing testing and treatment services specifically for young people,” the report noted.
Few girls know where to go to get contraception and if they do the environment is not youth-friendly as it is manned by older people fit to be their parents who look at them with scorn.
The youth therefore end up not visiting the health centres.
A local youth who fell pregnant at university, said she did not intend to get pregnant, but it happened unintended.
Rose agreed to use her first name only and said it was unfortunate that services were available locally, but the environment was not user friendly.
“I can go to my local clinic when ill, but I cannot go there and ask for contraception. The nurses there come from the hood and my mom would get a phone call before I even get back home. In the end no girl goes out planning to get pregnant when in college or school. It is when the unfortunate happens that parents now open up and speak offering a service which is one moment too late,” said Rose.
Rose regrets that she had to miss a semester as she nursed her baby before leaving it at home with her mother and going back to university to finish her programme.
National Aids Council executive director, Dr Tapuwa Magure speaking to the Parliamentary Portfolio on Health recently said NAC was committed to working with adolescents countrywide and had been working in some universities for some years now.
“We have been working with Midlands State University in Gweru for some years now and it is now an accredited anti-retroviral therapy (ART) site. We go there when they open for their orientation week for the new students and equip them with the new life and needs that they now face. We have also been working at Chinhoyi University of Technology, Solusi University, Great Zimbabwe University and at University of Zimbabwe,” Dr Magure said.
Dr Magure said staff handling ART had to be trained. The universities also need proper clinics to keep the medicines.
“In other universities they have clinics, but do not have the requisite facilities to keep ART medicines. Staff members at these universities need to be trained in ART and client handling too. We are however, working well at the universities that I mentioned,” he added.
The global report noted that adolescent girls were at risk of contracting HIV.
“More adolescent women, particularly at high risk for HIV, need access to HIV testing outside the context of pregnancy related care,” the report noted.
“Testing offers an opportunity for health providers to link young people living with HIV to appropriate care and treatment, including services to prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission,” it ended. Not only girls in universities are at risk of contracting HIV even their male counterparts. The issue of all colleges and universities being equipped with proper reproductive health services is urgent.
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