Barring pregnant nursing students from writing exam unconstitutional — Gender minister
The Ministry of Children, Gender and Social Protection, Nana Oye Lithur, has described as unconstitutional and discriminatory, the decision of the Mampong Nurses and Midwifery Training College not to allow three of its students to register and write their licensure examination, because they are pregnant.
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The sector Minister, Nana Oye Lithur, has therefore, advised the school to reconsider its decision and ensure that the students are registered to write the external examination.
In the interim, she told the Daily Graphic that the ministry would liaise with the Nurses and Midwifery Council and the Ghana Health Service to investigate the issue.
The licensure examination is an external examination organised by the NMC and is the final examination, a pass in which ushers students into practice.
It is scheduled to be written in August this year, but registration for it was closed last Friday. There is, however, room for late registration.
Nana Lithur said if the school wanted to be cautious about the health of its students to ensure that they were fit to write the examination, the ideal thing to do was for the institution to arrange a medical checkup for them.
She also said the school’s decision flew in the face of government policy to ensure that pregnancy did not become a barrier to the education of young women.
Complaints
The Daily Graphic of May 28, 2016 reported that three student nurses of the Mampong Nurses and Midwifery Training School in the Ashanti Region, including a married woman, had been denied the right to register to write their licensure examination because they were pregnant.
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Although two of them have been delivered of their babies, the school authorities have refused to allow them to write the examination because of a rule that has long been scrapped by the Ministry of Health.
A human rights lawyer, Mr Francis-Xavier Sosu, whose law firm, F-X Law & Associates, has taken up the case, last Friday filed a petition for an intervention at the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) in Accra.
“I want an immediate intervention to ensure that the students register and write their licensure examination,” he told the Daily Graphic.
The Daily Graphic also received similar complaints from the Agogo Nurses Training College where some students were compelled to defer their course because they were pregnant.
It’s a tertiary institution
Nana Lithur agreed with the demand, saying, “We should realise that they are in a tertiary institution and in their 20s; they could be in relationships and could also be married.
“There is a government policy being enforced by the Ghana Education Service that allows senior high school students to write their examination even if they are pregnant or even come back to write the examination after they have been delivered of their babies.”
She said what the school had done was wrong and unacceptable and, therefore, urged it to offer the students the necessary help to write the examination.
Information gathered by the Daily Graphic indicates that the rule is in the handbook given to every student who gains admission to nurses and midwifery training schools.
The rule demands that pregnant students defer their courses, while those who abort their pregnancies are dismissed.
But one of the students who spoke to the Daily Graphic on condition of anonymity said it was unconstitutional and a violation of her rights.
“It is not easy. It is emotionally very distressing and a very difficult time for me. I don’t know what to do,” she said.
Nurses and student nurses react
Meanwhile, some student nurses and nurses who have commented on the issue expressed different opinions.
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Daniel Espi Kporfor said: “Let’s be factual here. These three persons are aware that you can't continue schooling with a pregnancy, whether married or not. They should refer to their student handbooks. The stress one goes through during exams is not an easy one. That stress, I believe, can have negative side effects on the unborn babies. They know better, and let’s not forget it’s a training school, not a university.”
“If one is concerned about these codes being modified due to changing times, I strongly agree. I believe no one in any of the tertiary institutions in Ghana fancies the word "deferred”, regardless of the context or the circumstance. It's 2016; as such, amendments are necessary,” Nana Akua Agyei Dwomoh said.