Abstract
Child marriage is a widely spread practice which happens across countries, cultures and religions. Child marriage is defined as any formal union or informal union where one or two of the parties are below the age of 18. This practice mainly affect girls. 15 million girls marry into child marriage every year. The girls commonly affected by this custom live in poor families in rural areas of South-East Asia and African countries. This study aims at understanding the process of child marriage, and examining health and well-being among child brides as well as their access to health care in the Pokot community of North-Eastern Uganda. The issues were explored by using a qualitative research design. Thirteen in-depth interviews were carried out with adolescent married girls. This was followed by ten key informant interviews and three focus group discussions, two with married adolescent girls and one with elders in the village. The findings of this study highlights the complexity of child marriage, the intertwined issues of gender, poverty, “strong” traditional practices and norms that denies young girls to fulfill their potential in life. The married adolescent girls described their marriage as forced, however, they quickly adopted to their new role as wives. Fertility were seen to be extremely important and as a means to step into the adult world for girls. Hence, contraceptive methods were barely used, mainly due to men´s resistance. The majority of the young married girls participating in this study came from poor families, they had low levels of education. Further findings show that traditional medicine is important, however, the Pokot use Health care services from both traditional and biomedical health providers. Distance, cost of transport, health workers behavior and elders as decision-makers in married adolescent girls health seeking behavior were identified as the main barriers to health care utilization. Interventions that challenge cultural practices like child marriage are unlikely to succeed without a comprehensive understanding of the causes and consequences of child marriage in a given setting. Findings from this study explains the causes and consequences of child marriage among the Pokot in Uganda. These findings can inform programs and projects in similar cultural context, with an aim to end child marriage.