Dr Eugene Darteh, Key Presenter at a forum on the status of Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE), has expressed the need for CSE to be integrated into the schools’ curriculum.

This, he, said, would ensure effective teaching of CSE.

He noted that effective teaching of CSE would inure to the benefit of the country by helping to reduce sexual abuse and other related problems facing young people, who form the majority of the population.

Dr Darteh, who is Senior Lecturer at the Department of Population and Health, College of Humanities and Legal Studies, University of Cape Coast, made the statements in his presentation on the ‘Status of CSE in Ghana- Opportunities, Gaps/Challenges, Recommendations and the Way Forward.’

It was at a forum, organised by Ghana Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights, Alliance for Young People, to mobilise stakeholder support towards ensuring young people’s access to Comprehensive Sexuality Education in Ghana.

Dr Darteh explained that several factors accounted for rates of high sexual activity among young people, especially young girls which made the effective teaching of CSE imperative.

These included the early sexual maturity compared to previous generations, delay in the age of marriage due to time spent in formal education, as well as laws and attitudes that serve as barriers to public discussion of issues regarding sexuality and sexual behaviour.

While disputing the belief that sexuality education would make young people experiment with sex or be promiscuous, he insisted that teaching of CSE would rather empower young people with right information to take responsibility for their behaviours and to respect the rights of others.

He said the presence of these challenges posed a dilemma to the nation as to whether or not it would be able to reap the benefits of the much touted demographic dividend and whether Ghana would be able to achieve the sustainable development goals to be adopted in place of the millennium development goals.

Dr Darteh outlined some challenges facing the implementation of CSE, including reaching young people with sexuality education before they become sexually active either by choice or necessity, the perceived and anticipated resistance to CSE resulting from misunderstanding about the nature, purpose and effects of sexuality education.

He maintained that integrating CSE into the module would eliminate the challenge of lack of time for its teaching and getting teachers and students attention.

He called for stakeholders in CSE to get involved the on-going review of the National Reproductive Health Policy and for more training for stakeholders, including parents, families and community heads.

Professor Stephen Korankye of Regional Institute for Population Studies, University of Ghana, who chaired the forum, encouraged stakeholders to come up with tools tailored to the specific needs of the various groups of young people in CSE.

He said meeting the specific needs of the group is important because they constitute a large population with differences and could not be dealt with as one homogenous group.

He expressed dissatisfaction about the social, cultural and religious beliefs that prevent people from openly discussing sexuality, saying people especially parents should be able to educate their children to prevent them taking their peers’ misinformed advice.

Prof Korankye said there is the need for sensitisation on the policies on sexual reproductive health and rights and sexuality education since people tend to kick against them due to lack of understanding.