About 450 girls became pregnant in the Northern, Savanna and North East regions in 2020 during the Covid-19 break while students stayed at home.

Out of that number, 221 were unable to write the Basic Education Certificate Examination because of their pregnancy.

Speaking to the media at a donation of learning materials and Covid-19 PPEs by Right To Play, an international NGO, Northern Regional Director of the Ghana Education Service, Dr Peter Attafuah said 96 students were able to return and write the examination after delivery, while 133 wrote with their pregnancy.

He said even though the Ghana Education Service had anticipated that many may not return to school, these numbers are overwhelming.

Dr Attafuah said it could be possible that because the students stayed home for an extended period of time and remained idle for the most part, they found other ways of keeping themselves busy.

He, however, noted that pregnancy should not be a barrier for any girl to drop out of school.

He highlighted the 'Back to School' campaign, introduced by the GES to encourage girls who found themselves pregnant to return to school after delivering their babies in order to complete their education. This, however, is not to say that we are encouraging the girls to get pregnant, he said.

The Northern Regional Director of the GES said gone were the days any girl who unfortunately got pregnant had to abandon school adding that provisions have been made this time to allow them back to school.