Amid the rising cases of teenage pregnancies in the country, a female legislator has cited the need to fill in the gaps in policies by integrating comprehensive sexuality education in the academic curriculum to educate teenagers on healthy and responsible sexuality.
“Apparently, the community-based education and information campaign, and even the curriculum in formal education is lacking. I think we really need to integrate that in our curriculum—a comprehensive sexuality education,” Rep. Maria Lourdes Acosta-Alba of Bukidnon, chairperson of the House Committee on Women and Gender Equality, said in a news forum.
“I think our adolescents and teenagers should be made aware of how to be sexually healthy and responsible. They have to have a sexuality na safe, responsible and healthy and to really drum it up sa kanila tungkol sa mga risky behaviors when you engage in early sex and how this will have a detrimental effect on their future.”
Meanwhile, proponents and stakeholders on adolescents’ sexual reproductive health in the Philippines and Indonesia are advancing the knowledge of Muslim youth on the subject with the recent launch of the Comprehensive Gender and Health Education for Youth Module.
After three years of preparation, consultations and field testing, the Commission on Population and Development, along with Indonesia’s Ministry of the State Secretariat and the National Population and Family Planning Board, and the United Nations Population Fund, all working under the South-South and Triangular Cooperation on population, family planning, adolescent reproductive health and gender mainstreaming, jointly released the module on February 24, 2021.
Acosta-Alba cited the importance of collective efforts of all institutions in dealing with the increase in teenage pregnancy cases in the country, which she described as an “alarming phenomenon.”
“That’s the reality, it’s really happening. We cannot turn a blind eye on this disturbing phenomenon. We should all work together on how we can all find ways to really deal with this and address this—in our schools, our homes. Bottomline is really changing our mindset.”
The lawmaker from the first district of Bukidnon province said parents must also be equipped in educating their children about sex.
“We need to also equip not only our teachers, but our parents because more or less sa culture natin taboo ang pag-discuss ng sex to our children.
“That’s one thing that we have to hurdle, this mindset that it is ‘no, no’ to even talk about sex at home. But with the reality on the ground, with all the alarming statistics, we really need to do something.”