Pre-service Emerging Issues 2nd Year

Unit 91: Prevention of Sexually Transmitted InfectionsHealth and EnvironmentObjectives: By the end of this unit you will:• Understand how to prevent STIsIntroduction: In the last Unit on STIs we looked at what STIs are and what thesymptoms are. We also saw that there are several real dangers even before thedangers to your health: many STIs have no immediate symptoms so you can be infectedand not know it. The second real danger is that many of the symptoms are very similar.Sometimes people are afraid to be tested because they are afraid of the most seriousinfections – when in fact most of the infections can be easily cured with antibiotics. Butthat is the cure and we all know that prevention is better than cure.Activity 1: How do we prevent STIs?Conclusion Sexually transmitted infections can make people more susceptible to HIVand can cause a host of other diseases and general ill-health. The prevention and cureof STIs is an important part of reproductive health.Unit 92: Child Marriage and Teenage PregnancyGenderObjectives: By the end of this unit you will:• Understand some of the reasons for child marriage• Be able to provide some responses to the issues of child marriage• Understand some of the reasons for teenage pregnancy• Be able to provide some responses to the issues of teenage pregnancyIntroduction: In the MICS of 2005 it was reported that 36% of girls aged between 15-19years are married or in union. That is one in every three teenage girls. Given that thesegirls are considered married and adults, it is not surprising that they become pregnant:child-bearing is part of their duty. Of this 36% more than half (58%) are married to men10 years or more their senior. However, even the girls who are not married are fallingpregnant. In recent research done within UNICEF showed that 8 of the 10 communitiesand organisations contacted said that “a lot” of girls drop out of school because ofpregnancy. In Benevolent Secondary School in Gbendembu 19 girls got pregnant in asingle academic year (2007/8). Both of these aspects are destructive for the future ofour young women and both of them perhaps have similar causes.40