COVID-19 Crisis Could Push Millions More Into Child Marriage, Female Genital Mutilation: UN Report

The coronavirus crisis could push millions of more girls into child marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM), the United Nations said.

"The pandemic both makes our job harder and more urgent as so many more girls are now at risk," said Natalia Kanem, head of the United Nations' sexual and reproductive health agency, United Nations Population Fund.

UNFPA claimed that an additional 13 million girls could be married off and two million more could undergo FGM in the next decade, beyond what would be normally expected.

Further, the crisis may push several into poverty, prompting parents to get their daughters married early.

Talking about FGM, Kanem said: "When so many girls and women are unwanted, cut, erased, given, traded and sold, our common future is undermined. We should all be outraged."

Practices including violent sexual initiation rites, witchcraft accusations, branding, dowry-related violence, force-feeding and body modifications such as neck-elongation are rampant in India.

The report further said that 3,000 girls each day, are forced to marry young to older men. An estimated 4.1 million are at risk of FGM this year.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) female genital mutilation are procedures "that intentionally alter or cause injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons." The procedures are usually performed between infancy and the age of 15.