MANSEHRA: Child brides make up half of the women in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa who suffer from psychological and physical health issues, according to expert Dr Lubna Safeer.

Such women are provided counselling and healthcare in two districts of Hazara Division, but these services should be extended to other areas as well, Dr Lubna of the Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health Project told Dawn here.

She said the project was initiated by the government in Mansehra, Malakand, Swabi, Mardan, Chitral, Lakki Marwat, Dir, Nowshera, Haripur, and Dera Ismail Khan districts in 2021 as a pilot project to check child marriages and address their impacts, but couldn’t be stretched over to other districts in the province.

“Upper and Lower Kohistan, Kolai-Palas, and Torghar, where child marriage cases are very high but mostly go unreported, haven’t been included in that pilot project,” she said.

Dr Lubna said the basic purpose of the initiative was to assess the mental and sexual health of adolescents at the age of puberty, so the programme’s coverage should be extended to the rest of Hazara Division.

She said depression, marriage adjustment, anxiety, miscarriages, feeble health and medical issues, and iron deficiency were common health issues among child couples, especially girls.

“Multiple awareness sessions are held at our centres, schools, and colleges with local communities and even at the residences of child marriage victims in collaboration with family welfare workers,” she said.

Dr Lubna said the data collected in Mansehra showed that 50 per cent of couples facing health and psychological issues were those who were married off as children.

She said child or early marriages were not taken seriously in society, though they had devastating impacts for couples, especially women.

Published in Dawn, March 6th, 2024