Teenage Pregnancy

Teenage pregnancy rate has been increasing in the world since early 1990s. According to a research done by the 'Save the Children Foundation', annually 13 million children are born to teenage mothers under 20 years age. 90% out of this is from third world countries. Who are teenagers? What are the causes affected to increase teenage pregnancy? What are the problems that could be arised and possible solutions to reduce teenage pregnancy rate?

Children age between 13 - 19 years can be considered as teenagers. Age 20 is considered worldwide as the normal age for marriage. However, women in some countries like Africa are tend to marry at an early age. Because they consider having a baby at an early age as a blessing since it is a proof of a young woman fertility.

There are many reasons support to increase teenage pregnancy in general. Due to lack of sex education from parents, school or otherwise, teenagers are not aware how to deal with pressure come from peers, the risk of having unsafe sex, birth control methods, health problems, impact on the child born and other social and economical issues. Drug addiction is a another reason since it may encourage unintended sexual activity. Between 11% and 20% of the teenage pregnancy rate are direct result of sexual abuse. In some countries, domestic violence is a main reason to increase the rate. Socioeconomic factors are also highly contributed.

Infants of teenage mothers are more likely have health problems such as underweight, disabilities, abnormalities and many other. Due to the problems come from society and economy, this will lead to lot of other problems. The probability of daughters of a teenage mother getting pregnant is very high.

When we consider the solutions, especially, parents have to take the significant part of the responsibility of their child. Parents should talk to their teen about pregnancy and sex even though it is the toughest talk for a parent. It is required to keep communication with them and parents should be approachable by taking examples from the society. They must be emphasised about family values, attitudes and thoughts. Encouraging of teens on education as top priority, advising them about the problems associated with unsafe sex and more importantly getting know about what they are doing, where they are going and what people they are associating with will be the easiest and the best way to minimise teens are getting pregnant. Keeping family values on top is the only sure method to decease the teenage pregnancy rate.