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CONTRACEPTION AND SEXUALITY AMONG STUDENTS OF COLLEGE OF EDUCATION

CHAPTER ONE

1.1        INTRODUCTION

Sexuality and contraception among students continue to be a public health problem of immediate concern in developed and underdeveloped countries. While the knowledge of HIV/AIDS as an inevitable disease is high among Nigerians in general, HIV/AIDS transmission in reduction measures are inconsistently taken by sexually active individuals. The youths and adolescents are those that have high risk of being affected with STDS, if contraceptives are not used correctly or avoided, because the youths are vulnerable to indiscriminate sexual intercourse, with multiple sex partners.

Heterosexual transmission accounts for as high as 90% of HIV/AIDS in Sub-Saharan African where about 14 million people were estimated to be infected with HIV. The federal ministry of Health and Human Services (FMH & HS 1992) in Nigeria suggested that about one million HIV infected people exist. This prevalence is increasing due to high risk of sexual behaviours. These STDS diseases are mostly common among individuals younger than 25 years world wide. Several educators have shown that young people lack knowledge about prevention and the use of contraception and often have little or no idea about reproduction. Pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease among students is very rampant among undergraduate. Most of these pregnancies are unplanned and unwanted.  They are often terminated illegally by quark doctors in the dark. About 600,000 clandestine abortions took place in Nigeria in the 1980s some of which had disastrous consequences for the abortion seekers (African Journal of Reproductive Health, 2002). In most parts of Nigeria, sexual abstinence before marriage is expected from unmarried youths. However, studies show that premarital activity is high among adolescents. Parents, government and NGOS have expressed serious concerns about adolescents’. Sexual activity based on the board information that adolescent who engaged in sexual activity whether orally or otherwise often fail to use contraceptives thus, exposing themselves to the risk of unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections and diseases.

The lower age limit for admission into most Nigeria higher institutions is 16-18 years. This means that majority of undergraduates are in their late teens and early twenties. Most of them live away from home, in school hostels and rented apartments close to their institutions. These arrangements weakens parental control and supervision of student’s activities. They are often exposed to influences from friends, which encourage casual sexual relationship and have to take personal important decisions about their social and reproductive lives. Unfortunately the use of contraceptives among Nigeria students is very low due to the fear of side effects and negative cultural attitudes of parents/guardians to contraceptive use.

Other factors responsible for sexuality among undergraduate are that sex education is not part of secondary school curriculum in Nigeria and there are not obvious policies in most Nigeria higher institutions on the provision of reproductive health services, including contraceptive to the students.

This study is carried out to determine the sexuality and contraceptive practices among students as related to their awareness of HIV infection.         

1.2         STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEMS

Changes in the social environment coupled with exposure to western media, appear to have had profound influence on students sexuality in African. In a country like Nigeria whose students are judge to be among the most sexually active world wide, the issue of sexuality and contraception can not be over elaborated. Blane and Laky (1998) opined that youths who are sexually active often fail to use contraceptive. In a study of adolescents in Edo State by Peterson and Fakeye (1978), it was found that 13.4% of male had made a partner pregnant and 69% of these pregnancies had been aborted. Gueye et al (2001) observed that previously in many African societies, sexual taboos, rites and cleansing procedures were transmitted in conjunction with formal rituals, such as circumcision or initiation. Nowadays, the influence of such traditional 

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