A 17 year –old Junior High School pupil died when she took a local potion to induce a non-existent abortion. 

The deceased was alleged to have missed her menses, and suspecting pregnancy, she sought the assistance of a herbalist who was said to have prepared the potion for her to about the pregnancy. 

A family source that pleaded anonymity told The Mirror that the woes of the girl, a mother of one, I started on December 3, 2013 when she reported to school and started complaining of stomach pains. 

Back home, she had told her parents that she was rather having a ' headache, and so the efforts of the parents were geared towards getting her medication to get rid of the headache. 

She was later rushed to the Royal Hospital in Ho where doctors' revealed that she had taken a concoction which had destroyed the organs in the stomach. 

She died about three hours later. 

However, a check from her medical records did not indicate that she had been pregnant, indicating that she might have taken the potion when she thought she was pregnant.

At her funeral at Taviefe-Derne near Ho, there was near chaos between the Catholic Youth Organisation (CYO) and the youth group of the town over who had the right to convey her remains to .the cemetery for burial. 

She was a member of the CYO and so the group had come to convey her remains to the cemetery after the burial service, but the youth of the town would not agree, insisting that since she was a youth of the town, they must have the right to convey her remains for burial.

Their show of aggression ultimately led to the CYO leaving the remains to be carried by the youth of the town, while they followed. 

A friend of the deceased's mother, who only identified herself as Sheila, told this reporter that the deceased was the only daughter of the mother. 

According to Sheila, the deceased became pregnant while in ]HS 2 and the mother took the child after the delivery to enable the deceased to continue with her education. 

However, suspecting she was pregnant again the girl confided in a friend that she had missed her menses and went ahead to seek the assistance of the herbalist who prepared the potion for her to abort the foetus. 

Sheila said her friend explained that when the deceased took the potion, she bled a little but maintained that the entire foetus had not been destroyed and, therefore, continued to take the potion. 

Her visibly saddened mother could not hold back her tears at the funeral and kept on asking why her daughter kept the issue from her. 

A family source also said at a point the deceased emitted an offensive odour from the mouth but no one could say what was wrong, since she claimed she had a headache.