The Executive Director of the National Population Council (NPC), Dr Leticia Adelaide Appiah, has urged for urgent steps to reduce to the barest minimum or eliminate teenage pregnancy in the country.

She said the rate of occurrence of teenage pregnancy was more than alarming and something drastic must be done to curb it.

According to the Executive Director, the country's teenage pregnancy figures hit more than 500,000 within the last five years and the situation could be worse unless steps were taken to reverse the trend.

Dr Appiah, who made the call at a day's training workshop on population issues, organised by the NPC, in Accra, yesterday, said between 2016 and 2021, about 555,575 teenage pregnancies were recorded.

She said the critical nature of the situation required that the media take serious interest in issues of population and teenage pregnancy.

Dr Appiah stated that education on population was the pivot around which the development of any country depended, and urged the media to take interest in any such initiative.

"In countries such as Pakistan, the government had integrated population education in both formal and non-formal sectors and in their academic system from primary to university levels," she said.

Dr Appiah said there was the need to focus on a new era in collective improvement and open communication on population issues.

"We cannot openly communicate without relevant and functional knowledge because knowledge and education is a potent instrument of change for any nation. Knowledge is sharing and use is the most important public good," she said.