Shahzad Rasheed
Child, early or forced marriage or unions are a violation of children’s basic human rights. notwithstanding being prohibited by international law, it continues to steal millions of girls under 18 around the world of their childhood.
Early marriage is a detrimental practice that denies girls their right to make important decisions regarding their sexual health and well-being. It forces them out of education and into a life of poor scenario, with an augmented risk of violence, abuse, ill health or early death.
According to the figures of UNICEF, Child marriages or unions are a global phenomenon across many different countries, cultures, religions and ethnicities. Early marriage and forced marriage is highest in Sub-Saharan Africa where 38% of girls become child brides. By the same token, girls growing up in South Asia, 30% experience early marriage, as compared with 25% in Latin America and the Caribbean. Rates are 17% in the Middle East and North Africa, and 11% in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
Early pregnancy is one of the most hazardous causes and consequences of this harmful practice. Girls married early are more prone to experience violence, abuse and forced sexual relations due to imbalanced power relations. They are more susceptible to sexually transmitted infections (including HIV).
Going to school gives girls choices and opportunities in life, allowing them to play a positive role in their communities and break the cycle of poverty. Girls, who are married are not likely to be in school. Education, including comprehensive sexuality education, is essential for girls to be able to make informed decisions about their sexual health and well-being.
This unsafe practice denies girls the opportunity to develop to their full potential, with far-reaching ripple effects.
Girls who marry are not only robbed of their childhood. They are often socially isolated – cut off from family and friends – and discouraged or forbidden from attending school or finding a job.
The pressure to become pregnant once married can be intense, even though girls’ young bodies are not yet ready to give birth. Nor are girls usually equipped with the skills and maturity they need to become good mothers.
Early pregnancies put young mothers’ lives at risk and threaten the survival and health of their babies. Complications from pregnancy and childbirth are one the leading cause of death among adolescent girls in Third World countries. Infants of adolescent mothers are also more likely to have low birth weight, which can have a long-term impact on the child’s health and development.
Pregnancy also undermines the adolescent girl’s development because it stops her growth and negatively affects her nutritional status.
COVID-19 has played havoc with the lives of children and families across the globe and badly affected programmes to end child marriage. The pandemic is having a devastating effect on families, communities and economies. The full impact on countries with higher rates of poverty and fragile health, social welfare and governance systems, is yet to be seen. But government measures to control the spread of the virus – such as lockdowns – are particularly devastating for people whose livelihoods are based around informal economic activities.
The pandemic threatens in the medium and long run, the threat of child marriage is far greater when communities are affected by economic turmoil and have limited access to basic services such as health, education and child protection, all of which are being negatively impacted by the pandemic. The reality is that COVID-19 is driving many families into poverty, increasing risks that children will be forced into labour and marriage.
According to new analysis released by UNICEF on 8 March 2021, warns that school closures, economic stress, service disruptions, pregnancy, and parental deaths due to the pandemic are putting the most vulnerable girls at increased risk of child marriage.
Even before the COVID-19 outbreak, 100 million girls were at risk of child marriage in the next decade, despite significant reductions in several countries in recent years. In the last ten years, the proportion of young women globally who were married as children had decreased by 15 per cent, from nearly 1 in 4 to 1 in 5, the equivalent of some 25 million marriages averted, a gain that is now under threat.
Two years into the pandemic, abrupt action is needed to mitigate the toll on girls and their families by reopening schools, implementing effective laws and policies, ensuring access to health and social services – including sexual and reproductive health services – and providing comprehensive social protection measures for families, we can significantly reduce a girl’s risk of having her childhood stolen through child marriage.”