On Friday, Marie Stopes held a media engagement with members of the media fraternity aimed at creating a platform to dialogue, share lessons and reflection on the delivery of SRHR services.
Uganda and the entire world will be celebrating World Population Day on Saturday July 11th as the theme for the day is ‘’Leveraging Uganda’s population dynamics for a resilient future amidst Covid-19’’.
With the outbreak of Covid-19 and introduction of lockdowns or mandatory stay at home to keep safe from spread of the Coronavirus, most businesses and schools were forced to close down pushing a number of school age going children to stay at home for a while now. However, this has been quite a challenge as most parents haven’t kept a keen eye on their girl child, something that has exposed them to luring men with small gifts or false promises about giving them heaven and earth and thus increased teenage pregnancies during the pandemic.
According to Marie Stopes Country Director – Dr Carole Ssekimpi, Uganda has a total fertility rate of 5.4%, maternal mortality rate of 316 per 100,000 and teenage pregnancy rate at 25% which remain amongst the highest globally.
She adds that; ’In some districts such as Soroti and the island areas, teenage pregnancy rates go as high as 48%.
However she says that, the most common complicated area of pregnancy is abortion.
The increase in teenage pregnancy among adolescent girls and young women during Covid-19 pandemic has been attributed to limited access in family planning services and lack of information. Media reports have confirmed that 60 learners between the age of 14-15 years in Luuka and Kaliro districts are pregnant and likely not see the classroom when schools reopen.
The Covid-19 onset has brought about severe disruption of access to life saving sexual reproductive health services worsened by the existing inequalities for women and girls, and deepened discrimination against other marginalized groups including adolescents and young people.
Service providers like Marie Stopes have continued to support women and health systems by delivering essential SRH and healthcare services. Ensuring availability of family planning/SRH services during the crisis is critical to preventing longterm vulnerability of unplanned pregnancy, unsafe abortion, and other reproductive health challenges including gender based violence which has increased with the current lockdown.
Dr Carole concludes that, ‘’We know that during this time of redundancy and confinement at home, women are under a heightened risk of domestic violence and unplanned pregnancy. They need us more today than ever before.
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