TEENAGE PREGNANCY: A CRITIQUE PAPER

According to the Philippine Statistics Office, they conducted a survey during 2013 and
found out that one in ten young Filipino women age fifteen to nineteen is already a mother or
pregnant with first child. This results are alarming since it is not appropriate for a teen girl to
undergo with pregnancy because of the risk that it takes and also medical experts says that the
right age for a woman to get pregnant is during her twenties. Teenage Pregnancy is a global
problem, it does not only occur in the Philippines but also across the world especially in poor and
marginalized countries. In connection, Ramiro Molina Carters and Electra Gonzales-Araya, they
are both medical professional who are living in Chile, their field of interest in writing is
commonly about health, sexual education, and pregnancy as they recognize the fact that a proper
sexual education could lessen teenage pregnancy in their country. Both of the authors wrote an
abstract about teenage pregnancy.

The authors started their article by introducing teenage pregnancy as a social problem
that is prevalent in marginalized countries and some developed countries, the author emphasizes
that sexual education in both parents, children and teachers are highly important and this plays a
vital role for the reduction of the number of cases of unwanted pregnancies. The authors also
reminded its readers impliedly that doing teenage sex is risky especially to one’s health because
it may cause Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI). The preventive risk criteria were also
discussed that it reminds the teens the importance and use of health services in reducing maternal
and perinatal mortality. Furthermore, they also discussed the social factors that on early
pregnancy such as; types and characteristics of the family, early schooling after delivery, and
female unemployment and others. Lastly, the author concluded its abstract saying that there are
some measures that everyone could do in order to avoid teenage pregnancy,

Moving on, Carters and Araya were able to discussed a topic which is rampant and a big
problem nowadays which is teenage pregnancy. Since, they are medical experts their advocacy
on their article was informative and it reminds every one of the risk that teenage pregnancy could
impact to each individual. I would personally like to highlight their introductory part for the
reason of they have totally catch the reader’s attention automatically by stating that teenage
pregnancy is a social problem. The introduction has this “wonder” feeling for the readers on why
such teenage pregnancy is a problem and it makes the readers to ask its solution. Furthermore,
the article is informative and persuasive in an implied sense. It is informative for the reason of it
teaches the readers that teenage pregnancy is not as easy one and it entails risk, and it informs the
reader that this unwanted situation could be avoided with proper sex education. On the other
hand, it is persuasive due to the article made me realized that having sex in your teenage years is
not a good choice, and this is not something to be proud of, and most importantly having
unwanted pregnancy connotes big responsibility, therefore each one of us should be prepared
enough first before entering in this type of action. Overall, the authors were consistent in their
article they were able to justify that Teenage pregnancy should be avoided or even eliminated.

Moreover, the article has its weakness as well; First, the use of words, the author has used
several technical terms that a reader may not understand such as; adolescent fecundity, predictive
risk factors, STI and others. The wording was a bit inappropriate since it needs someone to have
a good comprehension and vocabulary skills for him to fully understand the topic. It is advisable
if the author have used basic terminologies that is easy to understand by the teens which are the
readers, or else if the use of technical words important it is better if the author defines the word
in a way that the reader may understand it. Secondly, on the body part the authors were able to
identify several factors which is good in order to establish the risks of teenage pregnancy.
However, I would like to point that the presentation of the factors was not effective, it becomes
informal in a sense due to the author only laid down the factors without discussing those. It Is
better if the author laid and explained well a few factors only. Thirdly, In a sense, their
concluding part was a bit lacking, the author just ended their article telling that there are
suggested measures that can reduce the adverse consequences of teenage pregnancy. However,
they did not discussed this anymore.

In conclusion, indeed it is a fact that teenage pregnancy is a global problem that we

(n.d.). Retrieved December 06, 2020, from https://psa.gov.ph/tags/teenage-pregnancy

Article of Teenage Pregnancy by Ramiro Molina Carters and Electra Gonzales-Araya,