Teenage pregnancy in Misor alarming

BOTH the city, municipality, and the provincial government of Misamis Oriental are urged to take steps to help in solving the problem of teenage pregnancy which is now very alarming in some areas of the province according to the report said Edgardo Abanil, Schools Superintendent of the Gingoog City Division of Schools.

Abanil said he wants both the city and the province to institute programs like reproductive health and sexual awareness.

While Teofilo Artiaga School Principal of the Medina National Comprehensive High School MNCHS also called the attention of the provincial government to address this problem.

Based on the partial report according to Caroline Neri, Assistant Department Head of the Population Office here, the number of teenage pregnancies only in the municipalities of the province are 726 victims as of the 3rd quarter of this year 2023 monitoring.

Mayor Taray who is the Chairman of Gingoog Bay Alliance GBA comprising the city of Gingoog and the municipalities of Magsaysay, Medina, Talisayan, and Balingoan was alarmed by the situation.

Mayor Taray said that he called the attention of all the newly elected city and municipal federations in the entire GBA area to start the steps to address the problem.

Taray said there are two towns in the GBA with the highest numbers of teenage pregnancies throughout the province Magsaysay is No. 1 with 75 and Medina is No. 3 with 68 victims all of the same period of this year.

Others in the GBA area Balingoan with 21 and Talisayan town 22 Taray added.

In their separate monitoring, Gingoog City has several teenage pregnancy incidents 272 as of November of the year 2023, ten (10) of them are ages 10 to 14 years old said Rachele Jade Espejon, Social Welfare Officer I of the Population Development Division of the City Social Welfare and Development Office CSWDO in the city.

Artiaga said the situation is very alarming as he confirmed there are several incidents in MNCHS which this school is the most populated in the eastern part of the province.

However, in every school there are interventions and measures to solve this problem, but it is still not enough, so the help and initiative of our officials in the province and local government units is needed said Abanil.

Mayor Taray said “manghinaot ko sa tanang mga SK official nga ila gayod matutokan ang maong problema.”

Meanwhile, he also called on all the barangay officials in the entire Gingoog Bay Alliance to work together to solve this problem.

Mayor Taray said that he would strengthen all Purok leaders in Talisayan to monitor the situations of teenage pregnancy.