Violent Conflict and Sexual Behavior in Rwanda. -A possible pathway of HIV transmission

This study focuses on the relationship between violent conflict and the timing of young women’s first sexual intercourse before marriage in Rwanda during 1990-2000. Rwanda was one of the African countries most affected by AIDS and also experienced civil war leading up to genocide in 1994. It is believed that violent conflict can affect the epidemiology of HIV/AIDS. The epidemiology of HIV may be exacerbated or inhibited, as conflict shatters individual lives and communities, depending on the characteristics of the conflict and the regional ecology of HIV. The study makes use of unique data on violent conflict at regional level in Rwanda that are linked to the sexual histories of individual women. I find that there is an increased risk of first sexual intercourse during years of conflict. This could possibly operate through contextual effects on sexual behavior, which could be voluntary sexual experience or forced sexual experience. Lack of parental and community control and rape being used as weapon of war are major theoretical pathways through which conflict could produce increased risk of experiencing first sex and increase the exposure opportunity and risk for STIs and HIV.