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Belgrade, (dpa) - A study released in Serbia on Tuesday shows that one out of every 20 adolescent girls in Serbia becomes pregnant and two-thirds of them choose to have an abortion.
According to the study commissioned by the Serbian government and conducted nationwide, young adults are insufficiently educated on contraception, pregnancy, sexually-transmitted diseases and similar crucial health issues.
In response, the ministry has put together a "reproductive health handbook" for distribution to primary school teachers, in order to encourage sex education early in children's lives.
Highlighting the problem, recent UNICEF statistics show that in Serbia and its former sister republic Montenegro, some 45 per cent of all people infected with HIV are between 15 and 29 years old.
Copyright 2006 dpa Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH
