teenage pregnancy statistics

one of the surveys conducted by a leading international organization called SAVE THE CHILDREN stated that annually 13 million children are born to women under the age of twenty more than 90% in developing countries. it also said that the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in the world was found in the sub-saharan africa. the united states has the highest teenage birth rate and a very high teenage abortion rate as well.
until 2006 there had been a declining trend in the teenage pregnancy numbers, especially since the early nineties.however, as of 2007 the teenage pregnancy rates have begun to rise again reversing the positive trends seen in the previous years.

Another effects of teenage pregnancy

Of those teenage girls who choose to continue their pregnancy, alarge proportion are from a disadvantaged or dysfuntional socio- economic background. They are increasingly young and, in many cases, were themselves born to teenage mothers. The generally occupy underpaid and undervalued work positions. these young women can nevertheless be very good mothers if they receive proper support.
Teenage mother often face the following consequences, social isolation, poor life habits, low education level, maltreatment, stress and depression. Although some teenage mothers can receive help from their family and those close them the scene is not particularly bright.

Movie Time!

Hello group members

I am not going to make any comment on our topic this time.
Just want you all to join me watching video related to teenage pregnancy.
Well, enjoy the movie!

The Poor Parenting Skills

Yes , I agree with you. The 'poor parenting skills' proves to be an important factors leads to this problem. Since both the father and mother do not know how to bring up their children as well as not knowing the roles of each one towards the house. Usually, mother send their kids to the kindergarden to bring them up. But , no one guarantees that the kids up in the proper way. Mothers are too busy to educate their family about relation between the father and child. The family is my keyword of my point. The family is considered as the basic unit of any cilivization on the earth. In Islam , the family is the foundation of the Islamic society. They should be some campaigns that emphasize on the roles and responsibilities of the man in leading the family. The man must leads the family not to destroyed them. So that, 'sumbang mahram' cases will not happen.

Not for girls only

Too often, adolescent pregnancy is viewed as a problem having to do exclusively with teenage girls. Overlooked are the teenage boys and men who share equally in this responsibility. Their need for pregnancy prevention information and services is no less important.

Current studies show that when fathers are involved in the physical care of their children before the age of three, they are less likely to sexually abuse their own or any other child in the future. To break the cycle of sexual abuse which often leads to teenage pregnancy, intensive family support programs, such as Healthy Families, are needed to teach fathers about parenting and help them connect with their children from birth.

Comment on The Roles of Mass Media & Roles of Society

Every year, young people are inundated with a barrage of messages about sex and sexuality from their peers and through the media. How do we ensure that adolescents are getting the right messages that will help them stay safe and healthy and avoid early parenthood?

I am agreeing with Noraida’s point in this view. Young people need to hear strong and consistent messages about responsible sexual behavior. Certainly parents - through discussion and example - carry the primary responsibility for guiding their children, and they should be supported in doing so. But the larger community, and especially the media, must regularly reinforce parents with complementary rather than contradictory messages.

My second opinion is that when children are isolated from their peers, lack positive adult role models or experience few successes, they are at-risk of slipping into problem behaviors. Communities must ensure that children have access not only to nurturing adults, but also to a broad spectrum of programs, activities, and service opportunities that can build self-confidence, bolster self-esteem, and forge positive connections.

Spread the Word

Assalamualaikum…….

Teenage pregnancy is an ongoing problem in today’s society, In fact it seems that everyone has an idea about how to “solve” the problem of teenage pregnancy, yet not much has changed. While small strides have been made in reducing the number of teenage pregnancies, the amount of money spent on prevention programs is disproportionate to the outcome. There are many possible reasons for this, such as the wrong populations are getting the wrong information, or teenagers are just not getting any information at all. However, as a society, we cannot respond to this by throwing up our hands and giving up! Rather we need to figure out what will work.
Because of widespread social concern over teen pregnancy, numerous prevention programs have been implemented throughout the nation.

According to American Medical Student Association who conducted a review of various teen pregnancy prevention programs across the country has evaluated five different types of prevention programs:
1) education programs
2) contraception distribution programs
3) programs designed to improve parent-child communication about sexual topics
4) multiple component programs
5) youth development programs

After I have read through the handbook published online, (feel free to access the web site: http://www.amsa.org) my conclusion is that of all the programs, multi-component programs, which included a range of community and media activities, showed promise for decreasing teen pregnancy rates when the programs were maintained for long periods of time. My evaluation on youth development programs, which focused on building self-esteem and learning life-skills, might be effective too at decreasing teen pregnancy rates. However, results of the National Longitudinal Study on adolescent Health suggested that greater time spent in parent-child activities reduced the likelihood of the child becoming a teen parent.

Untill next time…..

The Roles of Government

Teenage pregnancy is a problem, and there are solutions on how to solve it.Government and religious department also at wrong if they didn’t do their roles. Government and religious department must keep a check and enforce on law for the young. The penalization must be proportionate. For example , parents and teenagers need to paid as a penalty or the teenage that involve must be interned person until they are realize what they do.

Government and religious department are committed to promoting abstinence education programs and dissemination of information on promising approaches. Create the programs are built on the belief that the most effective programs are community-driven and support the involvement of parents and other adults in young people's lives. By focusing on abstinence and personal responsibility, variety program hopes to help young people develop their abilities to make the choices that will lead to a successful future.

Government can influence public attitudes and behaviors around teen pregnancy and sexually risky behaviors by using social marketing and public service campaigns. Social marketing seeks to change ingrained attitudes and behaviors that may not be perceived as harmful to the target audience. However, raising awareness about harmful behaviors or attitudes is not enough––the ultimate goal is to change the harmful behavior. Successful public service campaigns raise awareness and examine how interpersonal factors, institutional and community factors, and public policy affect unhealthy behaviors. A teen pregnancy prevention campaign usually includes a focus on changing individual sexual behavior, changing the social and cultural norms about appropriate roles and behaviors of teens, and supporting community-based programs that address teen pregnancy prevention or provide services to teen parents. Most public service campaigns that focus on changing unhealthy behaviors or cultural norms take time to have a long-term cumulative effect on social attitudes and behaviors and should not be viewed as a quick fix. Governments’ campaigns, state health departments, state social service departments, and broad-based state and community coalitions have developed public service campaigns to bring more awareness on reducing teen pregnancy such as "Kenali Anak Kita Campaign" were launched recently. A good public service media campaign, developed by a public relations firm, will contain a simple, catchy message that is repeated in media advertisements for television and radio, billboards, posters and brochures. In some cases, the campaign directs teens to established prevention programs or social services offices.

What I’m trying to say is government need to:-
· keep a check and enforce on law for the teenagers
· promoting abstinence education programs and dissemination of information on promising

approaches
· creating public awareness

The Roles of Society

Back to our previous discussion, I’d like to emphasize about society’s responsibilities.

Society is the manner or condition in which the members of a community live together for their mutual benefit. By extension, parents must cooperate with other parents in the society to solve teenage pregnancy. Today, both the parents in our society are working hard to earn more bucks and the result is while their house is being filled with precious items to show off , their most precious gift of God, is on the road to self destruction. While they are trying to fulfill their dreams and afford their children's dreams as well, our society often forget to ask their kid what he/she actually needs. While parents lose interest in parenting their children and the child misses out on love and affection, the two most needed things in a child's life. With no love and affection received from parents, the child goes wayward. It is, then, that your little angel tries to find someone of her own age and develops an emotional bond with the person. So, first step, society must conscious what the necessary for adolescent.

Rising number of teenage pregnancy is often quoted as an example, to prove that our society is going downhill. Young pregnant teens can be seen passing their time at food joints and hanging out with their friends, while being casual about their unplanned pregnancy. This may be essentially, because they are unaware of the huge responsibility that is on their way to get to them, where they will have to care for a child on their own. The world seems to go topsy-turvy, as mothers are yet kids and kids have become mothers. The irony of the situation is that while people blame younger generation for being so irresponsible, little attention is paid to the generation, who is parenting these teenagers and what they are doing to ensure their child’s safety and a secure future for her.

Society can get rid of teenage pregnancy by creating awareness among teenagers. It becomes the duty of every parent to advise their children on sex related issues. The next step to curtail teen pregnancy would be to encourage group activities. As a society, you should discourage early dating as well. It is also important for committee of the society to monitor the activities of their teens. Inculcating the right values, helping them to judge what is moral and immoral; the difference between good touch and bad touch and how to overcome peer pressure is what can solve this problem. Inability to address this problem of society will produce a generation of irresponsible adults who could ruin their lives with their own actions and consequently the lives of their loved ones.

Another step is society must incorporate a committee to help parents in overcome this problem. The committee can manage a program for the parents and children. Elements of such programs include :-

Realistic sex education.

An expanded network of preventive family planning services.

Teenage pregnancy counseling services.

Adequate prenatal, obstetric and pediatric care for teenage mothers and their children.

Educational, motivation and social services for adolescent .

Involve or engage your child in the society activities such as sports, dancing, painting, singing and so on. This way your kid would be too busy in his academic and extra society activities to think about other things.

Infuse in your child family traditions, ethics, values and principles. This way he/she would realize the do's and don'ts of their family ideals in the society.

No one program can possibly solve the many problems that are associated with teenage pregnancy. The solution must come from many elements of society: parents, Jabatan Agama Islam Negeri, the schools, state and local legislature and government agencies. Most people agree about the importance of services and research for teenagers, but there is not yet the willingness to pay the costs for such programs in most committee of the society.