你所不知道的:印度童婚大揭秘(图)

(Reuters) - A large proportion of women in India were married when they were still children, a study has found, and researchers warned that such unions carried higher risks of unwanted pregnancies and female sterilization.

香港（路透社）——一项研究发现，大部分印度女子结婚时尚属儿童。研究者警告说，这种结合伴有更高的意外怀孕和女性绝育的危险

Nearly all the women who were married before they reached the legal age of 18 reported that they used no contraception before they had their first child, according to the study, which was published in The Lancet.

在达到18岁法定年龄之前结婚的女子，几无例外地告称她们在生育第一胎之前都没有采用避孕手段。这是根据发表于《柳叶刀》上的此项研究所述。

UNICEF defines child marriage as marriage before 18 years of age and such a practice has been increasingly viewed as a violation of human rights.

联合国儿童基金会把童婚定义为18岁前结婚。人们越来越倾向于把这种做法看作是对人权的侵犯。

Marriage at a very young age carries grave health consequences for both the girl and her children and it is well documented that adolescent mothers are more likely to experience complications such as obstetric fistula.

岁数很小就结婚会给女孩本人及其子女带来严重健康后果。很多文献表明，少年妈妈更易罹患产科瘘等并发症。

Researchers analyzed data from a national family health survey that was conducted from 2005 to 2006 in India. The survey involved 22,807 Indian women who were aged between 20 and 24 at the time of the survey.

Of these, 22.6 percent were married before they were 16, 44.5 percent were married when they were between 16 and 17, and 2.6 percent were married before they turned 13.

2005到2006年间，在印度进行了一次全国性的家庭健康调查。研究者分析了调查的数据：调查对象包括22,807名当时年龄在20到24岁之间的印度妇女。其中22.6%在16岁前结婚，44.5%在16岁到17岁之间结婚，还有2.6%在13岁不到就结婚了。

"Women who were married as children remained significantly more likely to have had three or more childbirths, a repeat childbirth in less than 24 months, multiple unwanted pregnancies, pregnancy termination, and sterilization," wrote the researchers, led by Anita Raj at the Boston University School of Public Health.

“童婚女子明显地倾向于生育三胎或以上、24个月内连续生产、多次意外怀孕、妊娠终止以及绝育，”研究者在报告中写道。该研究团队的领导者是波士顿大学公共健康学校的阿尼塔·拉杰。

India introduced laws against child marriage in 1929 and set the legal age for marriage at 12 years. The legal age for marriage was increased to 18 years in 1978.

印度于1929年实施反童婚法，并界定法定结婚年龄为12岁。到了1978年，法定结婚年龄提高到18岁。

While the practice of child marriage has decreased slowly, its prevalence remains unacceptably high, and rural, poor, less educated girls and those from central or eastern regions of the country were most vulnerable to the practice, the researchers wrote.

虽然童婚的做法已经在慢慢变少，其普遍程度仍让人难以接受。乡下的、贫困地区的、受教育程度低的女孩以及该国中央和东部地区的女孩最容易成为受害者，研究者写道。

Such findings indicate that child marriage affects not only adolescents aged 16 to 17 years, but also large numbers of pubescent girls aged 14 to 15 years, and show that existing policies and economic development gains have failed to help rural and poor populations, the researchers wrote.

这一发现表明，童婚不仅影响到十六、七岁的青少年，还波及数量众多的十四、五岁情窦初开的女孩。研究还显示现有的政策和经济发展成果并未使农村和贫困人口受益，研究者写道。

They attributed the high numbers of sterilization in young women married as children to them having their desired number of children at an earlier age.

儿时结婚、现已绝育的年轻女子数量众多。研究者把其中的原因归结为这些女子生育的子女过早地达到她们所希望的数量。

But it was also indicative of inadequate fertility control, which was evident from the high numbers of unwanted pregnancies among these women.

但这也说明了生育控制方面的不足。这一点，从这些女子当中意外怀孕情况之多也可以看出。

They also warned that sterilization might reduce condom use in such couples, which would heighten the risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

他们还警告说，绝育可能使得这些夫妻使用避孕套的情况变少。而这将增大感染艾滋病病毒和其他性传播疾病的危险。

Child-marriage prevention programmes should be broadened to include interventions for women married as children and men who might pursue children for marriage, the researchers added.

避免童婚的举措应该扩展，要包括干预女童结婚和干预男子寻求与女童结婚。研究者补充道。