Group holds programs vs HIV, teen pregnancy

CEBU, Philippines — The Cebu City Youth Development Commission (CCYDC) will generate additional programs to educate the youth to prevent them from Teenage Pregnancy and HIV.

In an interview with The FREEMAN, Paolo Martin Saberon, the executive director of CCYDC, said the Cebu City Health Department and the Commission on Population have partnered with them in these activities.

During their recent meeting, one of the things they have agreed to do is the holding of a Programmatic Youth Development where they will train the youth to become facilitators and educators to promote awareness about HIV and early pregnancy.

They will also have a Parent-Teen Talk program that will expand communication among the stakeholders to discuss various concerns.

"It adopts a peer-to-peer approach that aims to enable both parents and adolescents to bridge the gap in discussing sexual and reproductive health issues so they can effectively journey together towards the attainment of their potentials and aspirations," read part of the content of the program's campaign profile.

Some of their participants are youth and parents.

He said that most of the youth today are very exposed to any platform and parents can help a lot by giving guidance not to over-indulge in things that will cause them problems.

In the National Demographic and Health Survey (2022) of the Philippine Statistical Authority (PSA), 5.4 percent or 5,531 women in the country aged 15 to 19 are engaged in early pregnancy.

The Department of Health (DOH)-7 has also recorded a large number of HIV infections that reached 8,407 (as of May 2022), and 4,993 (59 percent) of them come from Cebu City.

"Ato gyud nga hingosgan ang atong campaign kalabot anang mga butanga. Sa pagkakaron, ang gobyerno kay padayon nga nagdalit og libreng HIV testing ug uban pa nga mga program nga maghatag og awareness sa katawhan,” said Saberon. — GAN (FREEMAN)