Lawmakers alarmed at rise of teen births among ages 10 to 14

Lawmakers were alarmed at the Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) latest statistics on teenage pregnancies, which saw a rise in previous decades.

According to the PSA, six to seven percent of infants born to teenage mothers from 2016 to 2020 were fathered by men 10 years older. Meanwhile, a majority of adolescents who got pregnant had male partners three to five years older than them.

The statistics bureau presented the data to the Senate committee hearing on women, children, family relations, and gender equality on Tuesday.

Sen. Risa Hontiveros particularly expressed alarm at the rise of pregnancies from girls aged 10 to 14, 2,299 of whom gave birth in 2021. This was an uptick from the 2,113 births from the same age range a year before.

The senator argued that this was still in clear violation of the statutory age of sexual consent in the Philippines, which was only raised to 16 years old in 2022. For nearly a century, children as young as 12 could consent to sex — one of the lowest ages of consent in the world.

“As legislators and leaders of implementing agencies, everyone here in the room has a responsibility for each and every one of these young parents,” Hontiveros said.

Meanwhile, Sen. Sonny Angara was concerned about the fact that while pregnancies among teens aged 15 to 19 was on a decline since 2016, pregnancies among girls 10 to 14 years old even rose by 11 percent.

Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri asked Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla and Philippine National Police chief Gen. Rodolfo Azurin Jr. to arrest and prosecute adult men who initiate sexual relationships with minors, noting the country’s new age of consent.



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