Don’t deny adolescent people Family Planning services- public health nurse

Health workers have been urged to welcome and provide the best Family Planning (FP) options for adolescent people who would visit their facilities.

Mrs Esther Adjei, a Public Health Nurse at the Bono Regional Directorate of Health, gave the advice in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Sunyani.

She stated the adolescents had every right to access FP services, and therefore reminded health workers as a matter of importance to protect the confidentiality of those teenagers who would access such services.

Though she could not immediately provide statistics, Mrs Adjei indicated teenage pregnancy and sexually-transmitted infections (STIs) were recording disturbing figures among young people in the region.

Mrs Adjei said because of an increasing trend of cases, parents must encourage their sexually- active adolescents to access the FP services as there were several best FP options safe for teenagers.

She mentioned poverty, lack of sexual education, child marriages as some of the remote causes of teenage pregnancies in the region, and called for intensified sexual reproductive health education in schools to address the challenge.

Mrs Adjei said many of the adolescents were into active sexual behaviours, adding it was only through public sexual education that they would understand their sexual rights to protect themselves.

In a related interview, Mr Richmond Atta-Kwasi, the Bono Regional Health Promotion Officer, said besides health facilities, the Regional Health Directorate had set up adolescent corners, where teenagers could visit and access sexual education and FP services.

He advised sexually active young people to feel free to access information at the adolescent corners to improve their sexual reproductive health conditions.

Mr. Atta-Kwasi added parents and guardians must endeavour to draw, especially their teenage girls closer, to provide them with basic sexual education to

protect them against teenage and unwanted pregnancies.

Source: GNA