Teenagers opting for family planning
Teenage girls in Busia district are running to health centres with false information on family planning methods as the district registers thousands of teenage pregnancies.
The district has so far registered more than 9,000 (29%) cases of teenage pregnancies in the last 18 months.
Dickson Wamayina, the Busia District Environmental Health Officer, says most of the teenagers get misleading information from the internet on family planning and flock to the health centres with demands.
“We are in the digital era but there’s no health worker who can leave out what he was taught and begin following unreliable and unprofessional information got from the internet when providing health services. Whoever goes to a health centre to get family planning services should always follow the guidelines given to her by a health worker but not use information from the internet,” said Wamayina.
Teenagers opting for family planning
He says most girls use smartphones to google information about family planning methods and go with misleading information to the health centres, which they want health workers to use.
However, a section of the teenagers who have approached health facilities for family planning, claim they are instead treated harshly by health workers.
The girls say that most of them have been embarrassed by health workers forcing them to shun family planning services.
“The health workers need to improve and District Health Officers need to talk to health workers how they handle the youths who have come for family planning methods, to be at least exemplary to them and talk to them well. Instead of being injected for the service I will run away… and yet we need to avoid teenage pregnancies,” Wamayina said.
