Reproduction: Adolescent pregnancies trouble health experts

Health and Education experts in West Pokot County have raised alarm at the high rate of adolescent pregnancies leading to an increase in school dropout rates and the spread of HIV.

The teenage pregnancy rate in the region stands at 29 per cent, against a national average of 18 per cent. The Kenya Demographic and Health Survey of 2014 notes that three out of every 10 girls in West Pokot either already have a child or are expecting their first one before the age of 18. Other counties with high teenage pregnancy rates include Narok (40 per cent), Homa Bay 33.3 per cent, Tana River 28 per cent and Samburu 25 per cent.

Early sexual debut increases the likelihood of early pregnancy often leads to prolonged labour, which in turn leads to obstetric fistula. Early sex also exposes sexually-active teens to adverse health effects.

The National Population regional co-ordinator for the North Rift, Mr Moses Ouma, says cultural practices either force teenagers into early marriage or encourage them to engage in sex early, leading to pregnancy and health and socio-economic challenges.

“Girls will continue to drop out of school, face unsafe abortion, birth complications and other health challenges including death, unless urgent measures are put in place,” Mr Ouma says, adding that adolescent pregnancy also has a bearing on socio-economic well-being.

NEW TACTICS

Although action is needed to bring down the early pregnancy rate in West Pokot, Mr Ouma says that myths and misconceptions about contraceptives have posed challenges.

“There are claims that a woman who uses birth control will give birth to an animal or a weird-looking baby,” says Mr Ouma.

Others believe that condoms can get sucked into the stomach never to come out if used during intercourse. As a result, 37.3 per cent of girls and 40.6 per cent of boys aged 15-19 years who are sexually active do not use birth control to avoid unplanned pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections.

Apart from early pregnancy and infections, girls in the North Rift continue to face female circumcision as communities adopt new tactics to try to hide from the law against the practice. According to Ms Bernadette Loloju, an anti-FGM crusader, medical officers are colluding with female circumcisers to carry out the outlawed procedure in their clinics.

“Girls are admitted as patients in private hospitals, where FGM is done, then they are discharged after recovery,” Ms Loloju revealed during a recent anti-FGM workshop in West Pokot. In other cases, the perpetrators organise ceremonies that appear to be the popular women merry-go-round welfare groupings, only to have girls secretly mutilated late at night. Some girls are smuggled out to Uganda, where they undergo FGM before being brought back into the country.

Organisations like World Vision and the UN Population Fund, which recently released Sh9.3 billion to be used in the fight against FGM to below 21 per cent globally, continue to fight against the vice which is particularly rampant among pastoral communities like among the Samburu, Pokot, Maasai and Marakwet, despite having been outlawed.

The rates stand at 75 per cent to 78 per cent in these communities, remaining high despite the enactment of laws outlawing the vice and the introduction of alternative rites of passage.