At least three in 10 young girls have séx for the first time ever through rapé, says a survey.
The
survey by Positive Action for Treatment Access (PATA) investigated
reasons for high HIV prevalence and lower age of first séx among
adolescents aged between 10 and 19 and found "forced séx was the third
main reason for séxual debut" after love and peer pressure.
More
than 31.4% of girls, many of them living with HIV, reported "forced
séx", compared with less than one percent of boys, said Dr Morenike
Ukpong, who presented the study at a national dialogue on adolescents
living with HIV in Nigeria.
"If
31.4% of females can report their first séxual debut is rapé, I think
it is an epidemic," she told Daily Trust. "We have an epidemic called
rapé that we are not addressing. It is something to weep over."
The
survey, which asked 10-19-year-olds to fill out questionnaires and take
in focus group discussions, suggests young girls forced into séx are
significantly susceptible to infections.
"For
many of those that are HIV-positive, their exposure to HIV is because
of rapé. It is a risk factor for HIV infection and we are not dealing
with that," said Ukpong.
One
participant living with HIV admitted to a focus discussion group during
the survey that she "got her sickness through rapé" at age seven.
"And
the man said if I tell my mum or dad he would kill me. He showed me
knife and I was afraid, I was just 7 years old then. He was sleeping
with me every day and I was fearful to talk to anybody. I bled, my
sister saw it but I could not tell her what happened. My mum asked me
but I told her nothing. I was taken to the hospital; there I had to
confide in the nurse. I told her, she called my mum and told her.
"My
mum was crying, we went home and my dad also heard about it. After my
dad was told, he planned for the arrest of the man and the man was
arrested. A test was conducted on the man and on me and we tested
positive to HIV."
Ukpong
warned: "We are dealing with everything, prevention of mother-to-child
transmission, but nobody has ever focused on rapé as a transmission
route."
The
survey, funded by Ford Foundation, recruited more than a 1000 young
adults from 12 states--two per geopolitical zone--and targeted states
which have existing HIV management centres that could cater to young
people.
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