24 Jun 2014

The nursing officer at Tutume Primary Hospital, Ms Chendzimu Malinga has said issues of Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) in the Tutume Sub-district continue to be a challenge.

Speaking during the recent interactive meeting with members of the Teen Advisory Club at McConnell College, Ms Malinga stated that between 2011 and 2013, they recorded 3 847 cases of STIs.

Ms Malinga said the most hard-hit were child bearing groups aged 15 to 49 years and that the most recorded STIs were genital ulcers such as syphilis, herpes and others.

She expressed a concern that some people still indulged in risky behavior such as having multiple concurrent sexual partners and others did not consistently use condoms in a proper way.

“Despite our efforts to educate and inform communities about risky behavioral change, issues of STIs continue to rise and these statistics indicate that most people are still reluctant to practice safe sex and they do not heed the message on behavioral change,” she said.

She also said some of the contributing factors that lead to the rise of STIs are that diagnosed people do not bring their partners for treatment, while others discontinue their medication and as such re-infection occurs.

“People with untreated STIs make it easier for other STIs to enter the body, and such people are more likely to contract the Human Immune Virus and they can also re-infect their treated partners, “said Ms Malinga.

For her part, the Guidance and Counseling teacher at Mc Connell College, Ms Onalenna Edward said the purpose of the Teen Advisory Club-TAC is to support and encourage teenage schooling mothers to achieve their academic goals.

She said the club is also meant to address sexual reproductive health needs of teen parents as well as coming up with strategies that can be used to address challenges they encounter.

Ms Edward said the club is made up of teenage mothers who got a second chance to enroll back into the senior school and other local junior schools in Tutume.

The purpose of the meeting was to inform teen mothers about medical contraceptives as well as dispelling the myths associated with the contraceptives.  Ends