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Married men likely to have many partners, least condom use

Married women on the other hand are less likely to have concurrent partners than women who've never been married as are women in urban areas compared to those who reside in rural areas/FILE

Married women on the other hand are less likely to have concurrent partners than women who’ve never been married as are women in urban areas compared to those who reside in rural areas/FILE

NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan 20 – The recently released Kenya Demographic and Health Survey (KDHS) shows that married men are more likely to have concurrent sexual partners than their non-married counterparts yet are the least likely to use a condom.

The survey which took into account the responses of 12,819 men across the country as a representative sample, shows that the percentage of men with recent concurrent sexual partners increases with age and the percentage is highest among married men at 92 percent compared to 53 percent among men who are single.

The point prevalence of concurrent sexual partners is defined as the percentage of respondents who had two or more sexual partners concurrently at one point in time in the six months before the survey; the survey having been carried out between May and October, 2014.

Married women on the other hand are less likely to have concurrent partners than women who’ve never been married as are women in urban areas compared to those who reside in rural areas.

Of concern is a notable decline among men in condom use which decreases with age and is lowest among married men or those living with a partner (20 percent), those in Western (27 percent) or Coast (32 percent), those with no education and those in the lowest wealth quintile (31 percent).

“Forty percent of women and 44 percent of men who have had two or more partners in the 12 months preceding the survey reported using a condom during their last sexual intercourse. Among men this is a decrease from the 62 percent reported in 2009,” the report states.

Condom use among women has historically been lower than among men given difficulty of access.

The figures from Turkana are even more reason for concern given only two percent of men in the county reported knowing that using a condom and having sex with only one uninfected partner reduced their chances of HIV infection.

The KDHS, 2014 also showed that Kenyan women on average have 2.1 sexual partners in their lifetime compared to 6.8 for men.

Teenage boys (15-19) were found to have had an average of 2.8 sexual partners while the average among men between the ages of 50 and 54 is 11.7.

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