OPINION: Perfect Medieval Men
The number of pregnancies for girls ages 10 to 19-year-olds is a disgrace. Between 2007 and 2018, almost 170 thousand births of women of those ages were registered in the country, that is, an average of almost 1,300 births per month to adolescent mothers. Of that number, just over 4% are mothers between the ages of 10 and 14. And, to add insult to injury, abortion – many of them clandestine – was the fourth leading cause of death in 2018 among mothers, including girls and adolescents. This alternative to ending an unwanted pregnancy is used by many adolescents who put their lives at risk in clinics of dubious medical quality to carry out these procedures. The alarming figures do not even blink at those who prevent the State from providing our youth with sexual and reproductive education, although it is your direct responsibility. Governments have been genuflecting when it comes to assuming their role, as the authorities in turn fear to pay a political cost, a cowardly attitude that condemns thousands of adolescents to a life of hardship and deprivation since they are even required to abandon their formal education. We are, in this matter, perfect medieval men.-LA PRENSA, Sep 29
