By Aggrey Karani

The World Health Organization estimates that over 200 million girls and women alive today have undergone Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), with it mainly affecting girls mostly aged 15 to 49 years.

The primary group at risk of FGM are primarily young girls between infancy and adolescence and occasionally adult women who are focused under it during birth.

FGM is recognized internationally as a violation of the human rights of girls and women. This thus reflects the deeply-rooted inequality between the sexes and the extreme discrimination against girls and women.

With it always mainly being carried out on minors, it is thus a violation of the rights of children; it also violates a person’s rights to health, security, and physical integrity due to the torture and cruel, inhuman treatment whose procedures may result in the death of the victim of FGM.

FGM has no health benefits to the victim of the act. Instead, it has lots of harm to both girls and women in many ways. It is the removal and damage of the healthy and normal female genital tissue and interferes with the natural functions of girls and women’s bodies. These forms of FGM are highly associated with an increased risk of health complications, mostly during giving birth, which may lead to fistula.

FGM can cause severe and even life-threatening complications during childbirth. The scar tissue may not stretch enough to accommodate a newborn, making delivery even more painful than usual, which will lead a woman to undergo a Caesarean section.

The risk of other complications, such as obstetric fistula, which results in prolonged, obstructed labor without timely medical intervention, is also heightened. It is thus essential to protect our girls from FGM to prevent future complications.

The psychological impact of FGM can be devastating and long-lasting. Girls may feel deeply betrayed by their parents, who insist that they be subjected to FGM. This may lead to most girls running from home.

FGM practice affects girl child education by contributing
to the school dropout, early pregnancies, early marriages
and polygamy; this thus affects the child socially, emotionally, and cognitively, hence resulting in dropping in their academic standards, making them become discouraged in their studies.

Some of the ways to solve this menace are by strengthening the health sector to respond to the developing and implementing guidelines, tools, training, and policy to ensure that healthcare providers can provide medical care and counseling to girls and women who have undergone FGM by force or those living with shame and discrimination of FGM.

Building evidence-generating knowledge about the consequences and costs of the practice and also the health effects of the training will help us to know how to care for those who have experienced FGM and are undergoing stress.

There should also be increased advocacy in publications to educate the effects of the practice, and policymakers should come up with policies that are hush to anyone practicing the practice.

We should also try to utilize media platforms and communication channels to amplify messages against FGM can reach a wider audience and generate public support for ending the practice. This can involve campaigns, documentaries, and educational programs on our televisions.

Our communities should also be aware of the health burden of FGM and the consequences of the practice not only financially but also emotionally, mentally, and heath wise.

The government should give orders to the chiefs to ensure no or reduced number of FGM cases in villagers.

Aggrey Karani is a youth advocate