Miss South Africa 2021 runner-up Moratwe Masima has launched her reproductive health campaign.
Titled #Yourhealthyourdignity, this campaign is aimed at providing socio-economically disadvantaged women with basic education, insight, and resources to healthcare.
The 24-year-old medical doctor will be visiting schools and several communities to interact with young people, teaching them about reproductive health. She will be doing this with the help of nurses, teachers, and frontline workers who deal with reproductive health daily.
Masima started this campaign when she was interning at Charlotte Maxeke Hospital. She had to attend to a 10-year-old patient who was a victim of back street abortion.
“It broke my heart! I’d also heard desperate pleas for advice on abortion and contraceptives from teenage girls I met during my #YourHealthYourDignity campaign school visits. It is time to act, to save lives, and to prevent despair. Teenage pregnancies often put an end to schooling, and in turn, extinguish so many young women’s dreams,” she says.
Teenage pregnancy is a major problem in this country and what’s worse is that it’s the little girls who suffer the most instead of the baby fathers.
Stats SA revealed that in 2020, girls between the ages of 17 years and younger gave birth stood at a total of 34 587. What is more disheartening is that these young mothers are still children themselves, having to take on an adult role is not easy for them.
“Early pregnancy and motherhood in South Africa create a greater risk in terms of maternal complications, resulting in low survival rates of babies. And forces many girls to prematurely take on an adult role which they are not emotionally or physically prepared for,” read the report from Stats SA.