Teen Pregnancy: The Story of How It Feels to be Pregnant at 16

Fredrick Mugira

July 03, 2013

A typical day for a female student in secondary school in Uganda consists of attending class, hanging out with colleagues and maybe waking up early for morning preps. But for a senior two student Annet (not real name), every day has been unpredictable.

Annet, aged 16, is six months pregnant. She got pregnant on her first day of having sex.  The father of her kid is her classmate. They have both been studying at a secondary school in Isingiro district until Annet went into hiding.

I met Annet at Ruti Health Center III in Nyamitanga Mbarara municipality. She was among the people attending a sensitization meeting on reproductive health by FABS Production- a community based organization in Mbarara.

A sensitization meeting on reproductive health by FABS Production- a community based organization in Mbarara. Speaking is the Organization’s Director Innocent Nabasa.

Annet sat on the bench quietly. She did not interfere in her neighbors affairs. Her stomach protruded a bit. She had put on a little weight and her cheeks filled. To a casual observer, Annet seemed just fat, but what a wrong impression that was. 

She sat on the dusty bench with a plea in her eyes, but seemed not to have enough breathe to translate this plea into words.

I developed interests in Annet a few minutes before she sat down. She passed by a group of three seemingly rural women who all turned and looked at her. She also turned and glowered at them sullenly.

It was not until the end of the sensitization meeting that I came to talk to Annet.

I was about to read the message on a poster in the health center’s waiting room when the door of the counseling room opened and Annet came out.  

As I created rapport with her, a curious numbness began to spread over her.  It took the intervention of Nabasa Innocent, the Director of FABS Productions for Annet to tell me her story. As Nabasa tried to pick up the trend of our conversation, Annet felt more relaxed but her arms remained folded across her chest. She had already narrated her story to Nabasa in the counseling room.

Innocent Nabasa, the Director FABS Production addressing the participants

 “The first thing I thought about when I found out I was pregnant was to kill myself,” she said

As Annet further narrated to me in the local language Runyankole, I came to learn that she was coming from school when her schoolmate approached her and convinced her to start a love affair. The boy, a teenager too, did not offer her anything but she was easily swayed by her good behaviors and the caring attitude. That was close to the end of last year.

A few months later, she was pregnant. When her boyfriend (she refused to name him) realized that he was in danger of being arrested by police to face defilement charges, he tried to deny the pregnancy.

The more the pregnancy grew, the more she found it hard to wake up early in the morning to read. She couldn’t hang out with colleagues. Her class attendance deteriorated. She would be sick on some days. And for the fear of her parents noticing, she decided turn to turn to a lonely life.

As the stomach continued to protrude, she decided to drop out of school and hide from parents.  She is now hiding at her sister’s home in Ruti Mbarara. It is from her hiding place in Ruti where she learnt about the FABS Production’s sensitization meeting on reproductive health.

Participants, including girls of Annet's age attending the sensitization meeting

 As Annet continued to narrate to me with her face showing signs of pain, Nabasa listened carefully.

Nabasa told me Annet was heartened by a movie she had just watched during the sensitization exercise.

 “She narrated to us this same story while crying, we have referred her to our partners,” Nabasa told me.

Her referral letter indicated she was referred to Marie Stopes Uganda.

I gazed at Annet as she walked homewards confused. We bade no good bye. She held her referral letter in her left hand as the surrounding buildings and trees swallowed her.  

I wonder where Annet is now.  But I know she is one out of four teenage girls in Uganda that gets pregnant annually.

No place to land: Loss of natural habitats threatens migratory birds globally

On their epic journeys, often spanning thousands of kilometres, migratory birds cross many borders, link different countries as well as ecosystems.

The annual migration of an estimated 50 billion birds representing around 19 per cent of the world's 10,000 bird species is one of nature's great natural wonders. Yet each year, more and more of the natural habitats migratory birds need to complete their journeys either diminish or disappear completely.





The theme for World Migratory Bird Day 2011, celebrated around the world on 14-15 May, was ' Land use changes from a bird’s-eye view ' and it highlights the negative effects human activities are having on migratory birds, their habitats and the planet’s natural environment. The loss, fragmentation and degradation of natural bird habitats is occurring globally and is mainly caused by the pressures resulting from a growing human population, rapid urbanization and unsustainable human use of natural areas.

Beautiful Bird

“Although migratory birds face many serious threats, the way humans use the land around them has by far the greatest negative effect. Unsustainable human land use, whether through deforestation, intensive agriculture, biofuel production, land reclamation, urbanization and mining directly removes or damages the habitats of migratory birds, affecting their populations on a global scale”, said Bert Lenten, Deputy Executive Secretary of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) and initiator of the World Migratory Bird Day campaign.

World Migratory Bird Day was organized by the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) and the African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement (AEWA) - two intergovernmental wildlife treaties administered by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). BirdLife International, Wetlands International and the Secretariat of the Partnership for the East Asian – Australasian Flyway (EAAFP) are also main partners of the global campaign.

“As the two intergovernmental treaties dedicated to the conservation of migratory animals, including migratory birds at global and flyway scale, the Convention on Migratory Species and the African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement have launched World Migratory Bird Day to make people aware of the threats migratory birds face along their migration routes”, said Bert Lenten.

CMS and AEWA bring together governments and other stakeholders to coordinate and further develop global flyways policy, to ensure that all flyways in the world benefit from some kind of coordination mechanism that promotes cooperation at ground level among the countries involved. This includes working towards establishing a viable network of sites which can be used by migratory birds to breed, rest and refuel during their migration.

Dr. Marco Lambertini, BirdLife International’s Chief Executive said: ‘Land-use change poses an immediate and increasing threat to the world’s migratory birds. Habitats vital to these species on their incredible journeys are being destroyed or degraded at an alarming rate and the bird’s-eye view is becoming bleaker. The BirdLife Partnership, with over 110 conservation organizations along the world’s flyways, is working across borders to help stem this tide and achieve the effective joined-up conservation needed to make a difference for these inspiring birds.’

Initiated in 2006, World Migratory Bird Day is an annual campaign backed by the United Nations and is devoted to celebrating migratory birds and promoting their conservation worldwide.

Events for WMBD 2011 in over 50 countries included bird festivals, education programmes, presentations, film screenings and birdwatching trips, run by hundreds of volunteers, dedicated groups and organizations around the world.

Edutainment Strategy in Conservation of Environment and Agriculture Modernization

Considering the theories of emotional response which maintain that emotional messages in drama, music and humor in edutainment approaches to communication are more readily accepted by audience members and more likely lead to behavior change than messages with low emotional content, it is reasonable to believe that use of edutainment in promoting conservation of environment and modernization of agriculture is very vital.

Local people in rural areas come into contact with natural resources so often due to the nature of their daily chores. It would be paramount therefore to target them with edutainment approaches in conserving environment and modernization of Agriculture since they might not afford to buy news papers or and radio sets. Channels such as live theater performances and radio dramas which employ folk theater, puppetry, story telling, songs, music, mimes and folk dances would are paramount in this venture. I have seen this practically happen in several parts of Uganda and Rwanda. See the photos above showing local people in Rukungiri district of Uganda performing to the audience in an agriculture sensitization concert.

Several scholars including Barman (1998), Singhal and Rogers (1999) and Tufte (2005) have written much on this subject proving that the use of edutainment is vital in educating local people on various issues.

Handwashing Could Wash Away Diseases

Every 15th October the World marks Global Handwashing Day, in an effort to mobilize and motivate millions around the world to wash their hands with soap.

Handwashing with soap is one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to prevent diarrheal disease and pneumonia, which together are responsible for approximately 3.5 million child deaths every year.

Children are highly susceptible to the diseases caused by a lack of effective sanitation and poor hygiene. More than 5,000 children under the age of five die every day as a result of diarrheal diseases, caused in part by unsafe water, lack of access to basic sanitation facilities and poor hygiene.

By washing hands with soap, families and communities can help reduce child morbidity rates from diarrheal diseases by almost 50 per cent.

To achieve this reduction, and for large scale, community-sensitive, and sustainable change to occur, partnerships with national and local governments, international organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), religious and community leaders, schools and the private sector are essential.

After learning about improved hygiene behaviour in schools, children can act as agents of change by taking these messages home to their families and communities.

Handwashing with soap, particularly after using the toilet and before eating, could significantly impact health, survival, child mortality, and help reduce poverty.

Climate Change and Increasing population threatening Uganda's Animals

Authorities in Uganda are warning that increased population in the country coupled with climate change are greatly reducing on the number of wild animals in the country.

Jeconiuos Musingwire, the Western region focal person for the national environmental watchdog- NEMA says that more and more habitats for wild animals are being encroached on by local people who turn them into settlements. He also says that climate change is greatly turning habitants for such animals into uninhabitable.

He warns that in future such animals could have no place to stay if stringent measures are not taken now to control increasing population and harsh climate changes. I took these pictures in Lake Mburo national park in Uganda.