Gender-Based Violence (GBV) Overview

GBV Overview

• Gender-based violence (GBV) is a major public health and human rights problem worldwide, posing a significant threat to women's health and wellbeing.
• Prevalence of GBV varies by region and is often culturally specific.

Definition of GBV

• GBV refers to harmful behaviors directed at women and girls because of their sex.
• Includes wife abuse, sexual assault, dowry-related murder, marital rape, forced prostitution, selective malnourishment of female children, female genital mutilation, and sexual abuse of female children.

Types of GBV

• Physical: beating, hitting, slapping, pushing, punching, throwing objects/acid, using weapons.
• Sexual: unsolicited touching, harassment, attempted rape, rape, sexual slavery.
• Psychological: intimidation, relegation, abuse, curses, control, isolation.
• Economic: exploitation, cheating, underpaying, confiscating goods, depriving or stopping source of livelihood.
• HTPs (Harmful Traditional Practices): forced/early marriage, FGM/C, dowry-related violence, forced labor.

Violence Against Women

• Physical violence, sexual violence, psychological violence, economic violence, and HTPs.
• Types of violence experienced by women at various phases of life:
  • Prenatal: prenatal sex selection, battering during pregnancy, coerced pregnancy.
  • Infancy: female infanticide, emotional and physical abuse, differential access to food and medical care.
  • Childhood: genital cutting, incest, sexual abuse, differential access to food, medical care, and education.
  • Adolescence: dating and courtship violence, economically coerced sex, sexual abuse in the workplace.
  • Reproductive: abuse of women by intimate partners, marital rape, dowry abuse, and murder.
  • Old age: abuse of widows, elder abuse.

Prevalence of IPV in Nigeria

• 28% of women aged 15-49 have experienced physical violence since age 15.
• 11% experienced physical violence in the 12 months preceding the survey.
• 7% of women aged 15-49 reported experiencing sexual violence at some time in their life.
• 25% of married women aged 15-49 experienced physical, emotional, or sexual violence.

Risk Factors for GBV

• Women's subordinate position in society.
• Unequal power relations between men and women.
• Cultural beliefs and norms.
• Patriarchal values system.
• Prevalent illiteracy, poverty, and low status of women in society.
• Some aspects of statutory, customary, and religious provisions make women vulnerable to violence.

Ecological Model of Factors Associated with Partner Abuse

• Individual: being male, witnessing marital violence as a child, absent or rejecting father, being abused as a child, alcohol use.
• Relationships: parents, siblings, other family, friends, and peers.
• Community: religious groups, school, service providers, etc.
• Society: norms granting men control over female behavior, acceptance of violence, rigid gender roles.

Consequences of GBV

• Health consequences: non-fatal outcomes, fatal outcomes, homicide, suicide, maternal mortality, AIDS, physical health, mental health, reproductive health, low self-esteem, unwanted pregnancy, substance abuse, STIs/HIV, gynaecological disorders, unsafe abortion, pregnancy complications, miscarriage, and LBW.
• Interference with health care: delayed health care, burden on health system.

Prevention of GBV

• Multiple stakeholders: general population, parents, law enforcers, health care providers, education, media, practitioners, FBOs, community leaders, policy makers, governments, and NGOs.
• Strategies: public enlightenment, good role models, punishment for perpetrators, informed health care providers, support for victims, education, inclusion in school and health institution curriculum, sensitization, reduction of violence on TV, discussion of VAW, support for the oppressed, policies to protect women's rights, shelter for the oppressed.

Harmful Traditional Practices (HTPs)

• Early marriage: any marriage carried out below the age of 18 years, before the girl is physically, physiologically, and psychologically ready for marriage and childbearing.
• Factors contributing to early marriage: historical, religious, cultural, economic, and sociological.
• Rural women aged 25-49 marry at younger ages than their urban counterparts.
• Women in the NW marry at an earlier age than those in the SE.
• Women with no education marry 6 years earlier than women with a secondary education.
• Women in the lowest wealth quintile marry more than 8 years earlier than women in the highest quintile.

Obstetric Fistula

• Definition: abnormal connection between the urinary bladder and the vagina or rectum and vagina.
• Factors contributing to OF: immediate cause (prolonged obstructed labor), intermediate cause (reproductive and health care seeking behavior), and distant factors (socio-cultural, economic, and geographical factors).
• National recommendation: all deliveries should be supervised by a skilled birth attendant, each labor should be monitored using a partograph, and every woman should have access to emergency obstetric care services.