New offices for the Għożża service for teenage mothers were opened in Qormi yesterday to offer a more professional assistance.
The Educational Services Directorate has offered Għożża since 1991 and targets girls under 18 who get pregnant while still at schoo1.
It is professional but also offers the human touch, Education Minister Dolores Cristina said.
Last year, 32 babies were born to girls who were 16 or younger, and in 2009, 277 babies were born to teenage mothers out of the total 4,180 births registered.
The programme first tackled girls during pregnancy, then extended to mothers and their babies until they reached school age.
The new centre includes spacious rooms equipped with the apparatus required for a more interactive programme. The aim is also to offer privacy so that young mums-to-be can feel comfortable when resorting to its services.
Ms Cristina yesterday stressed the importance of the family and its support for members in need.
She appealed to young girls to use the service if they needed it, saying the girl’s parents often learned about the pregnancy from Għożża staff and would be helped to accept the situation and bring up their grandchild.
Without their family’s support, life would be much harder for the young mother, she said.
The programme also aims to bring out the capabilities of these young mothers and encourages them to continue studying, especially if the grandparents look after their child during school hours.
Għożża also helps bring out hidden talents, allowing the girls to integrate into society and earn a decent living.
Ms Cristina said pregnancy at a young age was not a new phenomenon and was not linked to a particular section of women.
“It is a reality we are living and is no longer considered a disgrace,” but she added it was an experience girls needed to be prepared for.
The director of the University’s Centre for Family Studies, clinical psychologist Angela Abela, had recently emphasised the need to know who these teenage mothers were and what was going on in their lives when they got pregnant.