expand sexual and reproductive health education
Gender inequality and discrimination against girls to an extent means they are often robbed of the right to make their own decisions, i.e., from what happens to their bodies, to whom they opt to marry, to whether or not their suggestions mattered on some very important topics, including those that concerns the girl-child and women.
Teenage pregnancies have enormous proclivity to rob girls of their potentials, i.e., by large and forever relegating their education to the background and giving them prematurely onerous adult = put to birth every year, as identified by Plan Ghana International.
The idea behind our actions and inactions is to ensure girls and young women realize their right to sexual and reproductive health and have control over their lives and bodies—this is critical to achieving gender equality. HRN works with partners in less privileged communities to enable access to information, quality and affordable sexual health services, as well as to eliminate harmful practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM) and early child marriages or forced marriages.
Child Marriage
12 million girls marry before the age of 18 each year, almost one every 2 seconds. If we don’t act now, more than 150 million girls will become child brides by 2030.
What is child marriage?
This is largely a forced formal or informal marriage and/or union entered into by an individual, who in most circumstances are girls before reaching a certain age, specified by several global organizations such as UNICEF as minors under the age of 18. Early marriage is a violation of children’s human rights. Despite being prohibited by international law via some global organizations such as UNICEF, it continues to thieve the childhood of millions of girls under 18 the world over—such a thievery may further and permeate into all facets of lives of these innocent victims.
Early marriages deny girls their rights to make vital decisions about their sexual health and well-being. It forces them out of education and into a life of poor prospects, with an increased risk of violence, abuse, ill health, and even untimely death.
Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)
At least 200 million girls and women alive today have undergone a form of female genital mutilation (FGM). If current trends continue, 15million additional girls between ages 15 and 19 will be subjected to it by 2030.
What is Female Genital Mutilation?
Female genital mutilation also known as female circumcision, is the excision or genital cutting that comprises all procedures that involves the limited or whole removal of the external female genitalia, or other injuries to the genital organs for non-medical reasons, which are mostly carried out between infancy and age 15. The procedure has no health benefits for girls and/or women. It violates the rights of girls to make important decisions about their sexual and reproductive health, because it is usually performed without permission and almost entirely against the victims’ wills.
LGBTIQ - Inclusion
Everyone, regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity, deserves equal access to opportunities and services, and their safeties ought to be protected.
Nonetheless, young people who identify as Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, and Trans-genders, Intersexes or Queers (LGBTIQ+) are among the most marginalized and excluded members of society. They are particularly vulnerable to stigma, violence, and discrimination owing to their real or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity.
This can have lasting consequences on their social and psychological health, and further to have substantial adverse effects on society as a whole.
Teenage Pregnancy
Every year, 7.3million girls become pregnant before they turn 18. Teenage pregnancy increases, thus amongst other things when sexual and reproductive health and rights education is absent, as well as when girls are denied the right to make decisions about their own sexual health and well-being.
What are the causes of teenage pregnancy?
The causes of teenage pregnancy, includes lack of access to sexual and reproductive health education and services. The expectations of some communities on girls to become early mothers can be a cause along with sexual violence. Approximately, 90% of births to teenage mothers in developing countries occur within marriage.
Parents’ low income and lack of girl-child education are also significant contributing factors that cannot be overlooked. Girls with little or not amount of formal or informal education on the subject matter are 5 times more likely to become a mother than those with higher levels of education.
In addition, the unique risks faced by girls during emergencies increase their chances to becoming pregnant, whiles teenagers.
Effects and risks
- Education interrupted
- Maternal mortality
- Premature birth
- Stillbirth
How is HRN helping girls?
protecting women
To address this, Hope Restoration Network (HRN) is working in alliance with other organizations like Planned Parenthood Association of Ghana (PPAG), and government agencies like Ghana Health Service (GHS) to improve and expand sexual health education that responds to the needs of the less privileged communities, especially young persons.
We work to ensure young persons can have access to SRHR information, education and services via our numerous programmes, including SRHR Community Outreach Programme at Anakum in the Western Region of Ghana. We also work to ensure community members, including opinion leaders, and parents are well informed about the usefulness of health services to children, youth, all and sundry, whiles we engage to support the provision of same. HRN listens and works with adolescents to tailor youth-friendly health education to the local context, based on a careful trend and situational analyses on the subject matter.
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