Sexually transmitted infections among young women aged 15-24 years in Uganda

Abstract

This study on Sexually Transmitted Infections among young women aged 15-24years in Uganda is a growing public health concern globally, with 374million cases acquired every day. This study however aimed at determining the risk factors for STIs among young women in Uganda and draws attention to the preventive measures that should be adopted to ensure that young women access safer sexual and reproductive health services (SRHS), which are some of the objectives of the study. The study however used Secondary data and STATA analysis. UGIR Individual record dataset was used from UDHS,2016 since it was focusing on only females aged 15-24years in Uganda. Frequencies, Chi squared tests and a logistic regression were used to determine the associations between STIs and other factors. A sample size of 8048 was used from a total of 15,506 women who were interviewed during the survey. Independent Variables were used in STATA analysis which included age, education, place of residence, religion, wealth status, number of sexual partners excluding spouse and marital status were used for analysis whereas the independent variable was had an STI. The study recommends various preventive options for young women against STIs which include women empowerment, condom use, media campaigns to promote sexual health and many other interventions. Also recommends that government of Uganda and other stakeholders as well as people from various communities’ work hand in hand to control a rise in these infections that affect young women especially.