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Research Article: Incidence of child marriage among refugees and internally displaced persons in the Middle East and South Asia: evidence from six cross-sectional surveys

Date Published: 2023-06-15

Abstract:
Objective To examine incidence of child marriage among displaced and host populations in humanitarian settings. Design Cross-sectional surveys. Setting Data were collected in Djibouti, Yemen, Lebanon and Iraq in the Middle East and in Bangladesh and Nepal in South Asia. Participants Adolescent girls aged 10–19 in the six settings and age cohort comparators. Outcome measures Cumulative incidence of marriage by age 18. Results In Bangladesh and Iraq, the hazard of child marriage did not differ between internally displaced populations (IDPs) and hosts (p value=0.25?and 0.081, respectively). In Yemen, IDPs had a higher hazard of child marriage compared with hosts (p value<0.001). In Djibouti, refugees had a lower hazard of child marriage compared with hosts (p value<0.001). In pooled data, the average hazard of child marriage was significantly higher among displaced compared with host populations (adjusted HR (aHR) 1.3; 95%?CI 1.04 to 1.61). In age cohort comparisons, there was no significant difference between child marriage hazard across age cohorts in Bangladesh (p value=0.446), while in Lebanon and Nepal, younger cohorts were less likely to transition to child marriage compared with older comparators (p value<0.001). Only in Yemen were younger cohorts more likely to transition to child marriage, indicating an increase in child marriage rates after conflict (p value=0.034). Pooled data showed a downward trend, where younger age cohorts had, on average, a lower hazard of child marriage compared with older cohorts (aHR 0.36; 95%?CI 0.29 to 0.4). Conclusions We did not find conclusive evidence that humanitarian crises are associated with universal increases in child marriage rates. Our findings indicate that decision-making about investments in child marriage prevention and response must be attuned to the local context and grounded in data on past and current trends in child marriage among communities impacted by crisis.

Introduction:
Child marriage, defined as any marriage or informal union involving two people of whom one or both are under 18 years of age, is widely practiced in all regions of the world but is especially common in low-income and middle-income countries. 1 Over the last decade, the proportion of young women who were married as children has decreased globally; however, it continues to be pervasive in many regions such as South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa and approximately 650?million girls and women were married before turning…

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