WUNRN
CHILD MARRIAGES - 39.000 EVERY DAY
Between 2011 and 2020, more than 140 million girls will become child brides, according to United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
If current levels of child marriages hold, 14.2 million girls annually or 39 000 daily will marry too young. Furthermore, of the 140 million girls who will marry before they are 18, 50 million will be under age 15........
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CHILD BRIDES - CYCLE OF POVERTY,
INEQUALITY, RISKS - LIFE SKILLS INTERVENTIONS IN INDIA
Every year, an estimated 14 million girls aged under 18 are married worldwide with little or no say in the matter. In the developing world, one in seven girls is married before her 15th birthday and some child brides are as young as eight or nine.
Neither physically nor emotionally ready to become wives and mothers, these girls are at far greater risk of experiencing dangerous complications in pregnancy and childbirth, becoming infected with HIV/AIDS and suffering domestic violence. With little access to education and economic opportunities, they and their families are more likely to live in poverty.
By Dr Ashok
Dyalchand, Institute of Health Management, Pachod (IHMP) Published: Wednesday 10 Oct 2012
Girls
learning about reproduction. Photo credit:
Dr Ashok Dyalchand works at the Institute of Health
Management, Pachod (IHMP) in
http://www.ihmp.org/ihmp_pachod.html
Why Reproductive and
Sexual Health of Adolescents is Important?
Life Skills Interventions can
effectively raise the Age at Marriage
Adolescent
girls are vulnerable to social and health risks that necessitate special
attention being paid to this group. One such risk is early marriage. An
extensive community based study carried out by IHMP in 1998-99 showed that the
median age at marriage for girls in
The
Life Skills Program at a Glance
Objectives:
1.
Improve the
social status of adolescent girls by developing skills related to gender, legal
literacy, and team-building.
2.
Improve
adolescent girls’ health status by increasing their cognitive and practical
skills in health and nutrition.
3.
Promote
self-development and increase self-confidence and self-esteem.
4.
Delay age
at marriage for adolescent girls by achieving all the above.
Structure:
A one-year course, 1 hour each weekday evening, taught by a trained village woman with at least a 7th grade education. A total of 225 one-hour sessions, divided into 5 sections: Social Issues & Institutions; Local Bodies; Life Skills; Child Health and Nutrition; Health.
Target
group: Unmarried
adolescent girls ages 12-18 years, with a focus on out-of-school and working
adolescents.
Current status of program:
Till date 6000 girls have already participated in the course from villages and
slums in Pune city.
UNMARRIED
ADOLESCENT GIRLS
Data and Methodology:
Data
were collected at baseline in 1998-99, using both qualitative and quantitative
methods. A quasi experimental design is being used to study the impact of the
life skills intervention. For the first round of the intervention, 17 study and
18 control villages are being compared.
To
examine trends over time, annual data on age at marriage has been collected in
the study villages since 1997.
Impact of Life Skills
Intervention on Age at Marriage :
Attendance
in life skills classes: Analysis from the first round of the life
skills intervention shows a significant impact on age at marriage. From the
sample of 1146 girls , only 9% of the girls who completed the course were
married before the age of 18 years, compared to almost one-third of the girls
who never attended. Girls who never attended the course were more than
two-and-a-half times more likely to get married before age 18 compared to girls
who completed the course. Girls who attended partially married earlier than
those who completed the course, but even partial attendance provided some protection
against early marriage compared to those who never attended.
Exposure
to life skills intervention: An analysis of determinants of early
marriage among girls in the control and study areas shows that, after
controlling for background characteristics, girls in the control area were
almost 4 times more likely to be married before age 18 than girls in the
intervention area.
Conclusion & Implications
Life
skill education results in a measurable increase in knowledge about basic facts
that can improve their quality of life. It also results in a measurable
increase in self confidence, self-esteem and decision making ability in
adolescent girls. Age at marriage can be considerably delayed by providing Life
skill education to adolescent girls. Sex education and education on sexuality
and conception is an integral part of life skill education and has the
potential fo reducing risk and improving reproductive and sexual health of
adolescent girls.
Life
skill education can be provided to both school going and out of school girls
through community based initiative . Not a single parent has objected to
education on sex, sexuality and conception provided to their daughters. The
intervention has the potential to be replicated in the whole of