By Akani Nkuna
Teenage pregnancy is not only a health issue, but a social justice emergency that needs collective action to combat it, according to the Deputy Minister in the Presidency for Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, Mmapaseka Letsike.
“In other words, today’s teen pregnancy is tomorrow’s poverty and inequality. We must recognise this as not only a public health issue but a social justice emergency. The high incidence of adolescent pregnancy in our country is interlinked with other scourges – HIV and other STI infection rates,” she said.
Letsike was speaking during a stakeholder engagement on teenage pregnancies in Pretoria on Wednesday.
In 2024, there were 90,000 reported cases of teenage pregnancies amongst girls aged between 10 and 19. A total of 2348 of those pregnancies were between girls aged 10 and 14.
“A child as young as 10 becoming pregnant is not just a statistic, but evidence
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