By KT Reporter
Teenage girls are continuing to use crude methods to procure abortions in Masaka district. A sizeable number of these adolescents are also afraid of seeking post-abortion treatment from qualified healthcare service providers, medical officers have noted.
Doctor Faith Nakiyimba, the Masaka District Health Officer, says that, unlike the grown-up women who suffer spontaneous miscarriages or deliberately procure abortions, the adolescents do not seek post-abortion treatment from qualified medical personnel.
As a result, she indicates that some of the victims are struggling with the resultant aftereffects, some of which include severe consequences of uterine damage or even removal.
She indicates that in the last year, the district registered 91 cases of abortions, and surprisingly, 36 percent, translating into 33 cases, were by adolescent girls aged between 15 and 19 years, most of them not ready for parental responsibilities.
Dr. Nakiyimba is concerned that many of the cases registered among adolescents were identified after they had been admitted to hospitals with post-abortion complications ranging from excessive bleeding, opportunistic infections, to uterus raptures.
She explains that their preliminary findings have suggested that a sizeable number of registered teenage abortions are also victims of gender-based violence, which becomes a scare for them and their caretakers to seek specialized safe medical support.
Dr. Nakiyimba has also expressed concern about the apparent lack of men’s support for their women, who suffer miscarriages or produce abortions for genuine causes, indicating that the reluctance also affects women’s attitudes to seeking post-abortion care from hospitals.
She observes that it is high time the parents gathered the courage to speak to their adolescent girls about their sexual behaviors and guide them accordingly, as opposed to inflicting stigma on them afterwards.
Dymphinia Nagawa, the In-charge of Bukeeri Health Center III in Buwugaa sub-county, where many of the victims were attended to with the after complications, blames the apparent low uptake of safe services and specialized post-abortion care to knowledge gap and negative public perceptions.
She is suspicious that many people in the community are stealthily using crude methods and treating complications with herbals for fear of facing stigma.
She has, however, indicated that they have heightened their health talks with their female clients, targeting to turn them into community change-agents, who are encouraged to speak to their peers bout the problem and the availability of treatment.
The 2022 Performance Monitoring and Action Survey report by Makerere University School of Public Health indicates that nearly half of all the pregnancies in Uganda (44%) are accidental, some contributed by unabated habits of sexual abuse against teenagers.
The report indicates that in some cases, women and girls are resorting to unsafe abortions as a remedy, thereby highlighting the need to heighten the use of family planning methods as part of the remedy.
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