Teenage pregnancies on the rise

By Florence Syme-Buchanan

THE findings of two major studies on the sexual behaviour of Pacific islanders and their atti tudes towards sex may identify why teenage pregnancy is such a big regional problem.

It’s hoped that island governments will use reports from the first time studies to upgrade reproductive health services and tackle reproductive health awareness, the latter often a sensitive issue in the Pacific.

In many Pacific staunchly Christian islands, the open discussion of sexual sub jects is frowned upon by churches who indirectly control many of the freedoms island communities have.

The two sub-regional projects have been sponsored by UNFPA with surveys being carried out in Samoa, Cook Islands, Marshall Islands and the Solomon Islands by demographer Dr Kesaia Seniloli.

Executed by the University of the South Pacific, research will focus on Women’s Reproductive Health Needs and their Perceptions of the Reproductive Health Service - the other project is Adolescents Sexuality and Fertility.

So far, Samoa and the Cooks have been completed. Dr Seniloli and research assis tant Maleafono Fa’afeu are now in the Marshall Islands where the growing popu lation rate is raising serious concerns.

In the Solomon Islands, Dr Seniloli says, it will be difficult to gather data because of isolated communities and diffi culty in reaching them.

Dr Seniloli says what is emerging from their studies is the big need for informa tion to be given to young people in the Pacific on sexuality issues and to women

on reproductive morbidity.

The Fijian demographer says there is evidence that young people are engaging in sexual activity at a much younger age.

As such “there is a need to note their opinions and their experiences to come up with policies and programmes for them,” she says. “Attitudes of people are still the same, there are the traditionalists who don’t want their children to be inter

viewed.” She said Pacific islanders, espe cially women, are not as well informed as they should be on the sexuality issue and what choices are available to them.

“So many cases they (women) are suf fering and not going to the doctor at all, women will take their children, take their husbands and they will be the last to go.”

She said many women interviewed complained of ailments and asked if she could cure them.

“Health departments need to smarten up, but the problem has been there is been no data on this.”

‘There is evidence that young people are engaging in sexual activity at a much younger age’

Three surveys target teenagers between 15 and 19, women between 15 and 49 and men aged between 20 to 54. Each module asks 90 questions ranging from how much respondents know about STD’s, and HIV/AIDS, perceptions about their roles and attitudes towards sexual behaviour.

The Pacific studies made headlines in the Cooks the same day a long-term expa triate doctor in the outer island of Aitutaki confirmed what the country’s Health min istry already knows but hasn’t made pub lic.

Teenage pregnancy is a real problem in Aitutaki where about 1,800 people live.

The island’s obstetrician Dr Yin Yin May says girls as young as 13 are having babies and she worries about “children having children” and the uncertain futures of these teenage mums.

She says like the rest of Pacific island states, young people become sexually active at a very young age in Aitutaki.

Numerous workshops and seminars on contraception and safe sex have not really helped bring down teenage birth rates.

The largest number of teenage pregnan cies in five years occurred last year - 11 of

the 51 women who gave birth were single teenagers, four aged 15.

Dr May says there has been a lot talk about taking the males who have sex with female minors to court, but this never hap pens, despite Aitutaki health authorities

reporting instances to police.

She gives the example of a 12-year old girl who became pregnant and Police were informed of the case.

“But the grandmother looking after the girl told them it was none of their business and said her granddaughter was not the first to fall pregnant so young.” Now aged 15, Dr May says the young mother can be seen “on the road playing, she is a child herself’.

Most girls who fall pregnant are expelled from Araura College where fami ly planning is discouraged by teachers, says Dr May.

Only two girls returned to college after giving birth. One is now studying at a New Zealand polytechnic, the other is said to be having difficulties coping, according to Dr May.

Boys who have fathered children have also been expelled. A number have been sent to main island Rarotonga to continue their education, “so where is the punish ment there,” she asks.

“It’s very sad because they are all chil dren, children having children, what is the future of this country - who is going to teach them what are right and wrong?”

“Most of the religious groups are against it (family planning/sex education) because they think it makes the young peo ple more sexually active. Religious groups attend the workshops, but their views do not change, so sometimes I wonder if these workshops are really benefiting the peo ple,” says Yin Yin May.

She says sexually active young people in Aitutaki need more awareness of what can be the consequences of unprotected sex.

And “guardians need to be more accepting that if a young person is sexual ly active, if they cannot stop the young person, then they have to help in another way.”

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“Family planning is not encouraging young people to be more sexually active, but is there to help them prevent unwant ed pregnancies”.

She talks sadly about the large number of teenage girls who visit her surgery cry ing and asking for abortions, which are illegal in the Cooks.

All she says she can do is to “console them and ask them to look after them selves and help them to be healthy”.

Dr May believes many teenagers are too shy to approach health authorities for contraceptives or family planning advice.

In 1994, of the 59 births in Aitutaki, ten were teenage girls.

A year later, that figure crept up to 12 teenage births out of 77. In 1996 and 1997, there were only five teenage births for each year out the 57 and 40 births on Aitutaki.

The obstetrician says it’s difficult to explain why teenage births jumped to 22 per cent last year. ■