A Critical Review of the Plight of Teenage Pregnant Girls Displaced by the COVID-19 Pandemic in Namibian Schools

Abstract

The phenomenon of teenage pregnancy has become a thorn in the flesh for many countries, including Namibia as many learners become pregnant while schooling. This study gives an exploratory analysis on the increased number of girls who were impregnated during lockdown. Pregnancies among learners threaten not only their human rights, but their health and social welfare, as well as the health and welfare of the children born to them. These young females often terminate their education, and this has implications for girls becoming uneducated, thereby hindering their ability to contribute to the socio-economic development of the country, as opposed to their male counterparts. This practice may lead to a perpetual cycle of the culture of poverty in which their children may further go on to become teenage parents. Using a critical review of secondary data, this study examined the higher rate of teen pregnancy among girls in Namibian schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. Numerous sources, including academic databases, scholarly journals, books, laws, policies, programs, newspaper stories, school reports, and guidelines for life skills education, are included in the literature review. The gathered data was subjected to thematic analysis in order to provide light on the difficulties that girls encountered throughout the pandemic. Therefore, this critical review paper focuses on four main areas: it presents the plight of teenage pregnancy displayed by COVID-19 in Namibia; depicts the ideas of learner pregnancy policy and life skills education guidelines; reveals factors influencing teenage pregnancy in schools in Namibia; and unpacks the implications of learners’ teenage pregnancy (pertaining to human rights, health, socio-economic, psychological/mental health) on education, women and girls’ empowerment agenda, and socio-economic development. The article concludes by unveiling strategies to mitigate the scourge (the fresh ways of dealing) with the plight of teenage pregnancy in this transforming society and point out some areas for further studies. Although the answers provided by theoretical analysis are not always definitive in nature, they might provide some insights into future phenomena.