Lost childhood: Harsh reality of adolescent pregnancies

 More than 300,000 adolescents become parents every year, with many dropping out of school.[istock]

At just 16, Stacy Mueni got pregnant. Though so evident, she remained in denial.

Mueni, from Mukuru in Nairobi, hid the pregnancy from her mother and kept off her peers, terrified of what lay ahead. Sadly, the man responsible disowned the pregnancy.

To avoid questions, she told people she was suffering from H. pylori, a bacterial stomach infection.

But her mother was unconvinced.

She closely monitored her, insisted on a pregnancy test, a move Mueni brushed off.

Reality would finally sink in, when labour begun.

The teenager who had never attended antenatal clinic (ANC) endured prolonged labour pains before being rushed to a health centre, where she delivered a baby girl, now aged one year and seven months.

“I had no idea what pregnancy or motherhood meant,” recalls Mueni, now 18.

Having dropped out of school in Form One, childbirth was traumatic for Mueni, worsened by stigma from healthcare workers.

“At the health facility, nurses and doctors insulted me for getting pregnant as a child. I felt scared and ashamed,” she says.

Motherhood soon introduced her to a harsher reality.

Her mother, who does casual jobs such as washing clothes, struggled to provide for Mueni, and her newborn.

“First week of delivery, was smooth because everyone celebrated and welcomed my baby.

‘‘But reality came — no diapers, no soap, and sometimes not enough food. Life became difficult,” Mueni told The Saturday Standard.

Early motherhood robbed her of both childhood and education.

“Going back to school is impossible because now I am a parent. There is no money,” she regrets.

Nevertheless, with support from well-wishers, Mueni has enrolled in hair and beauty training.

“The skills will help me to support my child. Becoming a mother too early closes many doors,” she says.

For 19-year-old Nancy* from Korogocho, pregnancy also shattered her dreams.

She became pregnant in 2022 while in Form Four, abruptly ending her ambition of becoming a nurse.

Today, stigma follows her everywhere.

“It hurts when parents in the slum use me as an example of promiscuity,” says Nancy. “Many of my peers avoid me because they think I will influence them into early sex”.

The father of her child, also a student, fled the area to avoid responsibility.

Nancy’s single mother cannot afford school fees, making a return to school to shape her dream of becoming a nurse impossible.

The experiences of the two teenagers mirror a growing national crisis of adolescent pregnancies.

Data shows that more than 300,000 adolescents become parents every year in Kenya, with many dropping out of school permanently.

Additional data from the National Syndemic Diseases Control Council (NSDCC) shows that 18 per cent of all pregnancies recorded in 2024 were among adolescents.

This represented 254,753 cases of all ANC attendances, representing children aged 10 to 19 years. In average, 698 adolescents visited ANC clinic each single day.

Additionally, 36 percent of all sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) cases involved children aged between 10 and 17 years, with reported cases among adolescents increasing eightfold from 2,466 in 2016 to 20,153 in 2023.

In Homa Bay for example, one out of five children presenting themselves to ANC were aged between 10 and 13 years, representing 23 per cent of all pregnancies in 2023.

The rising numbers have raised concerns among reproductive health experts, who warn that adolescent pregnancy continues to derail girls’ education, economic independence, and long-term well-being.

A study released this week highlighted that teenage pregnancy is one of the biggest threats to girls’ education. The 2025 Gender Report on Education by the Usawa Agenda, which is based on an analysis of national household and school data collected over recent years, shows that girls who are out of school are significantly more vulnerable to early pregnancy.

Nearly one in every four girls aged 16 who were not in school was reported pregnant, compared to just three per cent among girls still attending classes.

“If a girl is not in school, she is 12 times more likely to get pregnant than her colleague who is in school,” said the report, which found that 4.3 per cent of girls of school-going age are not learning.

Researchers further found that most teenage pregnancies involved younger learners, with six out of every 10 affected girls being in junior school. Alarmingly, some of the victims were as young as 13 years old.

Nationally, 1.5 per cent of teenage girls reported pregnancies in the year preceding the survey. Nairobi recorded the highest prevalence at 2.5 per cent, followed by Nyanza at 2.1 per cent and Rift Valley at 1.8 per cent.

Across informal settlements and rural communities, many teenage mothers remain trapped in cycles of poverty, social isolation, and dependence, with limited access to education or economic opportunities after childbirth.

“As a nation, we have to pose and ask ourselves, is that healthy for us, is that the way to go? No, it is not the way to go” says NSDCC Chief Executive Officer Douglas Bosire.

More worrying, Bosire says is that young children do not have sexual negotiation power, risking triple threat - sexual gender-based violence, unwanted pregnancy and pre-exposed to HIV infections.

“They (adolescents) cannot negotiate for safesex because perpetrators are older, and therefore hold more power than them in terms of energy and financial means. So the young girls are at a point of disadvantage,” adds the NSDCC boss. Nationally, 10 counties contributed to 53 per cent of all new HIV infections, among them Nairobi, Kisumu, Homa Bay, Nakuru, Siaya, Migori, Uasin Gishu, Kakamega, Kajiado and Narok.

Bosire emphasises that despite the prevalence of HIV having reduced in counties like Homa Bay from 28 per cent recorded in the 1990s to 15.2 per cent in 2023, the number of adolescent pregnancies that trigger infections is on the rise.

The inequities, he says, imbed Kenya’s journey to ending HIV as a public health threat by 2030.

Even as Kenya talks revolves around ending adolescent pregnancies, experts warn the country risks losing a significant portion of its young population unless urgent support is extended to pregnant and parenting adolescents, researchers have warned.

According to APHRC, adolescent pregnancy remains a major challenge, with one in four girls in Sub-Saharan Africa becoming pregnant before turning 18.

In Kenya, 15 per cent of adolescent girls become pregnant before 18years old, although the burden is much higher in some counties, where rates reach up to 50 per cent.

“In some counties, one out of every two adolescent girls become pregnant before turning 18,” says APHRC researcher Caroline Kaburu.

She notes that teenage pregnancy is driven by multiple factors, namely limited access to contraceptives, inadequate sexual and reproductive health information, sexual violence, and poverty.

Some girls particularly in informal settlements, are forced into transactional sex to access basic needs such as food and sanitary towels.

Nevertheless, while efforts are largely focused on preventing teen pregnancies, thousands of adolescents who already become parents are often forgotten.

“If we do not support them to return to school, access vocational training, or secure employment, we are disadvantaging both them and their children,” observes Kaburu.

Further, she calls for their inclusion in social protection programmes, including cash transfer schemes, to help young mothers care for themselves and their babies.

A study done by Directorate of Children Services, in collaboration with APHRC and Miss Koch Kenya, in Korogocho, in Nairobi, found that pregnant and parenting adolescents face multiple challenges, including school dropout, mental health struggles, and gender-based violence.

In the 2024 study released last week, titled Understanding The Lived Experiences Of Pregnant And Parenting Adolescents, eight out of 10 of girls reported having unintended pregnancies.

First time

Also, seven out of 10 of the girls were single, with five out of 10 were still in school at the time they became pregnant for the first time.

Drivers of early pregnancy include curiosity about sex, low contraceptive knowledge, naivety, family conflict, limited parental support and supervision.

Girls were also found to be at risk of unintended pregnancies because of poverty, sexual violence, and Covid-19 related school closure.

“Approximately four in five of the girls reported that their pregnancy was unintended,” reads a section of the report finding.

Most of the girls were not married at the time they first became pregnant, with about half having been in school at the time of their first pregnancy.

“Most girls first had sex while still in school (73.7 percent), while 56.2 percent did not use condoms the first time they had sex,” adds the report.

Despite pregnancy related complications, only four out of 10 girls visit ANC, with one in three completing eight ANC visits as per the WHO recommendation.

Barriers to ANC access include lack of support from parents or guardians, limited information on ANC, social stigma, poverty, shame, ignorance, and fear of healthcare providers. Despite limited ANC access during childbirth, girls reported mistreatment and abuse, including physical and verbal abuse, stigma and discrimination.

Additionally, child support was identified as a major challenge facing adolescent parenting, with one in two girls reporting lack of support.

“Three in four girls reported being unable to provide for their babies needs, including food, clothes, diapers, and medicine,” adds the report.

During the study, two out of every five girls who were not in school said they would like to go back to school, but lacked resources.

However, repeated pregnancies is a major challenge while addressing issue of pregnant and parenting adolescents.

Repeated pregnancies is attributed to lack of support after delivery, according to Community Health Voices Network, operating in Korogocho and Viwandani slums.

“Children giving births have no source of income, they are therefore forced to exchange sex for food, and sanitary pads, but in the process, they get pregnant again,” regrets the networks representative Ritah Anindo.

Girls determined to go back to school are also stigmatised and discriminated by fellow learners and teachers.

As a solution, Anindo observes the need to have learners access sexual reproductive health services, and integrate policies that addresses needs of adolescents wholesomely like health, education including return to school for those getting pregnant.

Anindo adds that young mothers should also be included in policy formation and implementation process for solutions.

Contrary to increased cases of adolescent pregnancies, about half of married women do not want to bear children.

This is according to Kenya Demographic and Health Survey (KDHS) 2022.