Save the Children sounds alarm on the number of Romania's teenage mothers

The Save the Children organization sounds alarm on the high number of Romanian teenage mothers, pointing out that the country has nearly 13,000 teen first-time moms, over 3,600 two-time teenage moms and about 700 girls who have already had their third baby. According to the organization, despite a slight decrease in the number of births to teen mothers in 2018, both for girls aged less than 15 (from 743 in 2017 to 674) and for those aged between 15 and 19 (from 18,173 to 17,307), the situation remains "concerning" as regards the birth order by teenagers. Thus, of the teen moms aged less than 19, 12,906 are at their first baby, 3,657 at the second, 673 at the third, 63 at the fourth, seven at the fifth, and one at the sixth, says Save the Children citing semi-final data for 2018 from the National Institute for Statistics. Children born to underage mothers are vulnerable both socially and physically, and there are many cases of premature births or pregnancies that have not been under medical monitoring, the organization mentions. According to official statistics, out of 674 babies born to mothers aged less than 15, only 79 have a teenage father (aged less than 20). In the category of mothers aged 15-19, out of 17,307 children, only 2,202 have been fathered by a teenager (in this category, there are also fathers aged over 65). "Most of the time, teenage mothers come from poor environments without access to constant and quality medical assistance. This has extremely serious, and unfortunately, irreversible consequences: premature births, high infant mortality, children raised by children in precarious social and economic environments, which actually perpetuates discrimination," said Save the Children executive president Gabriela Alexandrescu. As regards the distribution by environments, most teenage mothers are from rural areas - 65 percent of those aged less than 15, and 67 percent of those in the 15 to 19 age bracket, Save the Children adds. AGERPRES (RO - author: Iulia Carciog, editor: Claudia Stanescu; EN - author: Simona Klodnischi, editor: Simona Iacob)