Reproductive Health Knowledge and Practices among Junior Secondary School Grade one Students in Enugu State: Threat to Achieving Millennium Development Goals in Nigeria

ABSTRACT

Objective: This was designed to provide background information for the implementation of family life and HIV/AIDS education in post primary schools in the Enugu State. Methods: A cross sectional survey of the reproductive health knowledge and practices of 412 junior secondary school pupils from 12 schools in Enugu State; Nigeria was undertaken using a uniform set of structured self-administered questionnaire. Results: The results revealed that while the pupils demonstrated fair knowledge of human biology; they lacked knowledge of selfprotective mechanisms as it related to sexual health. About (50) of the participants reported that they have had sex; at the age of less than 11 years when they must have been in the primary school and most (89.3) at age 11-14 years. Half (50.9) of the respondents hold the belief that a girl would not get pregnant in her first sexual encounter. Statistically more of those who have ever had sex were betrayed this ignorance (p=0.004). The boys were less certain about what constitutes the wrong ideas about reproductive health systems than the girls (p=0.042). In the same vein; there was a difference (p0.0001) in the proportion of the rural residents; vis-a-vis their urban counterparts that could correctly identify the wrong ideas about human reproduction. Conclusion: This situation urgently calls for concerted efforts at addressing the poor reproductive health knowledge of these sexually active young people; for the millennium development goals (MDGs) target to be realized in Nigeria