By: Sarah Volpenhein
Produced & edited by: Tim Tripp
Guatemala has one of the highest rates for adolescent
pregnancy in Latin America, with about one quarter of all newborns birthed by
adolescents.
The number of pregnant girls has been steadily
climbing since 2009 when Guatemala began monitoring the situation, said Juan
Enrique Quinonez, the Adolescent Development Specialist at UNICEF’s bureau in
Guatemala. Last year about 61,000 adolescent girls were pregnant, an increase
of half since 2009.
Alejandra Colom, professor at Valle de Guatemala
University and program coordinator with Population Council, said that the government
began shining light on the problem in part due to children’s rights groups
becoming “more vocal.” She also pointed to changes in Guatemalan law that pushed
for protection of women and children.
In 2009, the Guatemalan legislature passed the Law
Against Sexual Violence, Exploitation, and Trafficking of People, which made
any sexual relations with girls less than 14 years of age a crime.
In 2012, about 4,000 girls ages 10 to 14 became
pregnant according to UNICEF. About 30 percent of them—or enough to fill about
40 elementary school classrooms—were raped by their own fathers according to a
report filed by the Human Rights Ombudsman in Guatemala.
Since the introduction of the 2009 law, about 4,000
cases of sexual assault on girls have been brought to the judicial system, said
Quinonez. This year, the first convictions were carried out under the new law
with 20 people sentenced for rape.
As part of the law, for every pregnant girl who enters
a hospital or medical center, a report must be filed with the courts, which are
then obliged to investigate. What this process does not address—and what the
statistics do not count—are the girls who never visit a hospital during pregnancy.
In rural communities where access to health care is limited, this is a reality.
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| Teenagers in Guatemala waiting for their pre-natal exam. Photo via "Tuschman" Wordpress blog |
Adolescent pregnancy is more frequent in certain
communities, usually in rural areas according to Saul Interiano, Director of COINCIDIR, a children’s
advocacy group in Guatemala.
“The health
system is non-existent in those communities,” he said.
In 2005, the
Guatemalan legislature passed a law that guaranteed universal access to
contraception and reproductive health education.
“[Contraceptive]
methods are currently available in all health services for free,” said Gustavo
Batres, an employee of the Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance.
But
according to Interiano, contraception is sometimes denied to adolescents.
Conservative
values still run deep in Guatemalan society. Sometimes a girl will be denied
contraception if a man does not accompany her to the health center, he said.
Teenage Pregnancy Making It Difficult for Girls to Finish School
Education is
also very limited in rural areas. According to the Inter-American Development
Bank, girls ages 10 to 12 living in urban areas are almost two times more likely
to finish primary school than their peers living in rural areas.
Girls
without access to secondary education are more likely to marry early and have
children, said Colom.
Pregnancy,
however, is also a reason for girls to drop out of school.
Claudia
Paredes, who runs a youth education program called “My Health, My
Responsibility,” is trying to change that phenomenon. Her program has worked
with 40,000 young people.
“We want
them to finish high school because many of them drop out of school because they
become pregnant,” she said.
She founded
the program in 2008 as a way to spread reproductive health education to boys
and girls in high schools. Youth leaders travel to high schools in rural areas
of the country and talk about self-esteem, relationships, and sex, among other
topics.
“That’s what
we’re working on in this country … that girls need to be girls and study. They
don’t have to be moms,” she said.
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| Workshop to combat violence against women and teenage pregnancy. Photo via centralamericannetwork.org |
Still, the
number of adolescent pregnancies has not budged despite a growing movement to
prevent adolescent pregnancy in Guatemala.
Colom lays
the blame in part on government officials, who she says lack political will and
are too conservative.
“It plays a role at the
level of the Ministry of Education where the Minister [Cynthia del Águila] is
very conservative and she would not promote or move forward with sexual
education curriculum for example,” she said.
No Dating in Guatemalan Schools
In 2011, the
Ministry of Education prohibited dating in schools.
Although sex education is required in schools under
that 2005 law, the conservatism of the culture sometimes causes schools to shy
away from the subject, said Colom.
“It’s easier for the teachers to ban it than to
address it,” said Interiano.
The Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance,
along with a number of other governmental departments, signed a letter pledging
their support of reproductive health education.
When asked
what needed to happen for dramatic changes to be seen, Colom said “someone who
enforces the law. A more productive administration. Growing demand from
adolescents … Civil society is keeping the topic alive.”
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