About Teenage Pregnancy

    A Threat to the Economic Growth of the Country         One of the most pressing issues that the Filipino youth are facing today is teenage pregnancy. A UNFPA-commissioned study in 2016 revealed that those adolescents in the Philippines who have begun childbearing before the age of 18 are less likely to complete secondary education compared to the adolescents who have not begun childbearing. The non-completion of secondary education impacts employment opportunities in the future and total life earnings of families. The net estimated effect of early childbearing due to lost opportunities and foregone earnings can be as high as 33 Billion pesos annual losses for the country. In the Nairobi Summit in November 2019 that marked the 25th anniversary of the landmark International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), the Government of the Philippines expressed a strong pledge to recommit the country to the 1994 ICPD Programme of Action that promotes sexual and reproductive healt

               Adolescent pregnancy is a complex issue with many reasons for concern. Teenage pregnancy is a natural human occurrence that is a poor fit with modern society. In many ways it has become a proxy in what could be called the cultural wars. On one philosophical side of the debate, political and religious leaders use cultural and moral norms to shape public opinion and promote public policy with the stated purpose of preventing teen pregnancy. To begin,  Martin, et al. 2012  provides national vital statistics on teen pregnancy.  Leishman and Moir 2007  provides a good overview of these broader issues. Demographic studies by organizations like the Alan Guttmacher Institute ( Alan Guttmacher Institute 2010 ) give a statistical description of teenage pregnancy in the United States. The number of teen pregnancies and the pregnancy outcomes are often used to support claims that teenage pregnancy is a serious social problem. The other side of this debate presented in publications