The following facts I am presenting is to give you an idea of the impact of the work we do and what would be happening if Keep The Dream196 no longer existed. Some of these statistics are horrifying but this is what we deal with. Please be mindful that even as we are talking about statistics, each number represents a child.
FACT #1 The proportion of women, by the time they are 19yrs of age, who have ever been pregnant is 25%. The teenage (10-19yrs) pregnancy rate is 13.9% of all registered births in 2016, this does not include home births, still births, abortions, unregistered births or miscarriage. The number of deliveries by under 18yr olds in 2016 at medical facilities is only 7.4% and so a large proportion have home births which increases maternal mortality and neonatal mortality. During covid, this rate climbed to 20% of all girl children under the age of 18yrs became pregnant.
KTD196’s pregnancy rate is 0.07% over 19yrs, 12 girls over 19 years have become pregnant while in our program.
We have saved the government over R177million in Child Support Grants they do not have to pay out. This does not include costs associated with 2,017 teenagers attending:
FACT #2 There are 400,000 new HIV infections (23%) per annum amongst adolescent girls and young women aged between 16-24yrs. Because our children are abstaining from sexual activity the possibility of becoming HIV infected is negligible. However 23% of 14,516 girls over 19years = 3,339 girls potentially infected by HIV x R991 (Cost of Antiretroviral alone per year) that is a saving of R3,308,632 per year. The savings to government in 10years over R30million.
This does not include:
Keep The Dream196 has trained over 1,500 children in HIV prevention and gender based violence prevention. We also have trained over 150 HIV Peer Educators to share the truth of HIV and to dispel myths that still pervade this society.
HIV/Aids is a tragic needless loss of life to families, communities and the nation, but our impact doesn’t stop there!
