High teenage pregnancy in Mt Prov alarms execs

BAUKO, Mountain Province – Teenage pregnancy is alarmingly on the rise in Mountain Province making authorities institute measures to address this.

Some 110 students of Bagnen National High School (NHS)  here who attended symposium on Adolescent Reproductive Health were informed about physical changes during adolescence, sex, gender and human sexuality, sexual orientation, and reproductive health concerns following recent Symposium on Adolescent Reproductive Health Care.

Prior to this, the school requested the provincial government through the Provincial Population Office in partnership with Nursing Department of the Mountain Province State Polytechnic College (MPSPC) to conduct symposium on Adolescent Reproductive Health Care for students.

Provincial Population Officer Shirley Chiyawan presented the situation of the Filipino young people.  This includes increasing youth population, lifestyle, preference to the use of different forms of media and gadgets, engagement in non- sexual risk behavior, experience of physical violence as an aggressor or as victims, awareness and experience of harassment with the use of technology, engagement in sexual activities, teenage fertility.

Chiyawan also cited increasing teenage pregnancy in Mountain Province from year 2011 to 2013.  With this, she encouraged participants to think and consider the risks involved on their health and their future in every decision they make.

Alfred Fomocao Jr., college instructor of the Nursing Department in MPSPC focused his lecture on health, behavior, and lifestyle saying physical growth and development, sexual differences, psychosocial development, psychosexual development, behavior, and lifestyle among adolescents were issued that needed urgent attention.

He said teenage pregnancy which Cordillera Administrative Region has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in the country. This was according to a 2013 Young Adult and Fertility Study conducted by the University of the Philippines Population Institute.

Fomocao ended his lecture with his encouragement to the participants to take care of their body as it is the only place they have to live in.

Meanwhile, on behalf of Bagnen NHS, John Libongen Jr. thanked the speakers for sharing the information that their students should know to become empowered youth in their school and in the community. --  Alpine L. Killa