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11 Facts About Child Brides

Child brides are most common in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
77 percent of 20 to 24-year-old women were married before the age of 18 in Niger.
- In Bangladesh this rate is 65 percent.
Girls who marry before 18 are more likely to experience domestic violence than their peers who marry later.
Girls younger than 15 are five times more likely to die in childbirth than women in their 20s. Pregnancy is the leading cause of death worldwide for women ages 15 to 19.
100 million girls will marry over the next decade. That’s 25,000 girls every day for the next 10 years.
Girls with higher levels of schooling are less likely to marry as children.
- In Mozambique, about 60 percent of girls with no education are married by 18 compared to the 10 percent with secondary schooling.
Girls living in poor households are almost twice as likely to marry before 18 than girls in higher income homes.
Girls ages 15 to 19 are two to six times more likely to contract HIV than boys of the same age in sub-Saharan Africa.
Child marriage is a violation of human rights whether it happens to a girl or boy. And is perhaps one of the most prevalent forms of sexual abuse and exploitation of girls.
The world's poorest countries have the highest rates of child marriage. Families often marry girls off to lessen their economic burden and provide a future for their daughters.
Worldwide, 36 percent of women ages 20 to 24 were married before they were 18.