Bringing reproductive health 'baggage' to Nghe An youth

My Ha• DNUM_BDZBBZCACC 12:43

(Baonghean.vn) - Reproductive health and sexual health education for adolescents and young people is extremely important because these are subjects in the transitional period between childhood and adulthood, with many changes in psychology and physiology. The Nghe An Population Department, through many vivid and attractive forms of propaganda, has created a meaningful playground for school-age children and helped them improve their understanding of reproductive health.

Many practical and meaningful playgrounds

The Golden Bell Contest “Learning about population and reproductive health for adolescents and young people” was recently organized by the Department of Population - Family Planning in collaboration with the Yen Thanh District Medical Center at Bac Yen Thanh High School and received the participation of more than 1,500 students in the whole school. It has been a long time since the school located in a difficult area of the rice district has had such an “explosive” atmosphere in an outdoor extracurricular activity. The contestants went through 33 thrilling and dramatic questions and it was not until the third supplementary question that the winner was found.

Children also participate in games, answer questions including knowledge about population, adolescent reproductive health and understanding of other fields such as: culture, society, history, about the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union...

Golden Bell Contest at Bac Yen Thanh High School. Photo: MH

As the winning student, Nguyen Van Thang - class 12A1 said: "To participate in this contest, my fellow contestants and I spent a lot of time learning about reproductive health and many other issues surrounding school age. I found the contest very useful because we not only got to participate in games and experiences, but also directly listened to doctors and uncles and aunts from the Department of Population - Family Planning share a lot of knowledge related to the gender of school age".

This is the first time the "Golden Bell" playground to learn about population and reproductive health for adolescents and young people has been held at Bac Yen Thanh High School and not only the organizers but also the teachers were surprised by the enthusiastic participation of the students.

“We have gained a lot from this contest because with the school’s capacity, it would not be possible to organize such a large-scale, systematic and interesting contest. More importantly, the contest is very practical for students, addressing a rather sensitive and delicate issue that has long been a concern for schools. I think that after the contest, we will have a different approach to gender issues to help students gain more knowledge and skills.”
Teacher Nguyen Ba Thuy - Principal of Bac Yen Thanh High School

The Golden Bell Contest “Learning about knowledge about population and reproductive health for adolescents and young people” is a playground that has been implemented by the Department of Population - Family Planning for many years for high school students. The interesting thing about this contest is that it attracts the participation of many subjects including teachers and students, the organization is lively, attractive and creates excitement.

Counseling on reproductive health knowledge for candidates participating in the Golden Bell contest at Thai Lao High School (Hung Nguyen). Photo: MH

To bring meaningful moments to candidates, population workers inDepartment of Population and Family PlanningIt took a lot of thought when designing the program, including creating the script, coming up with questions, and organizing activities around the competition such as performing arts, implementing folk dance programs, and teachers' competitions to help the contestants. Some schools also established cheerleading teams in a systematic way to compete for the most professional and attractive cheerleading team.

Flexible, dynamic and targeted

“Be a girl to shine” is the latest contest organized by the Department of Population and Family Planning with the participation of students from 3 secondary schools in Nghia Dan district. This is also the first time a contest on reproductive health has been implemented for secondary school students - an age group that is still curious about gender but has not been provided with much knowledge and skills.

Talking about the reason for implementing this contest, Mr. Nguyen Huu Quang - Head of Population Communication Department, Provincial Department of Population - Family Planning said: "Vietnam is currently facing many problems related to adolescent reproductive health, gender imbalance at birth... Through the contest, we hope to contribute to raising awareness, changing people's concepts and behaviors on gender issues and to motivate and encourage girls to be confident and strive to exercise their equal rights in the future. This is also an opportunity for students to demonstrate their talents, intelligence, creativity and access accurate and reliable information on child care.reproductive healthand improve understanding, knowledge and basic life skills to be aware of protecting one's own health, have a healthy and pure lifestyle, and preserve the innocent and lovely features of school age".

Teams from Nghia Dan district participated in the contest Be a girl to shine. Photo: MH

Also in October, many communication sessions on reproductive health care, sexual abuse prevention and reproductive health care services were organized for more than 3,000 students at Quy Hop High School, Quy Hop 3 High School, and the district's Continuing Education Center.

Through the communication program, children are provided with basic knowledge about reproductive health care, physical and psychological changes in adolescents and young adults, and at the same time, help them understand and have positive behaviors in reproductive health care, creating provisions for entering life.

Although equipping knowledge and skills on reproductive health care is extremely important, due to many different reasons, the number of students who fully understand this issue is still limited. Meanwhile, with the development of social networks, students can easily access inappropriate and inaccurate information. In fact, through direct consultation sessions, there are many quite simple issues that students do not fully understand or completely do not grasp the basic knowledge.

A communication session on reproductive health care consultation - Prevention of child sexual abuse for students in Quy Hop district. Photo: PV

That is also the reason why, in the past, the situation of dropping out of school to get married early and the situation of abortion still occurred among school-age children. Currently, on average, every year the whole country has nearly 300,000 abortions, mainly among the age group of 15 - 19. Of which, the rate of abortions over 12 weeks old accounts for nearly 80% and 60 - 70% of abortions are among students; the rate of complications due to abortion is still high. In addition, the number of children abandoned due to unwanted pregnancies, although not many, still exists.

To improve the effectiveness of reproductive health care for adolescents and young people, Mr. Nguyen Ba Tan - Head of the Provincial Department of Population and Family Planning said that strengthening the connection between schools, families, unions, and social organizations in educational activities on population, reproductive health, and gender equality for target groups is extremely important.
In the coming time, the Population sector will continue to innovate propaganda activities at the grassroots level, focusing mainly on students at schools.