Vietnam Population and AIDS Indicator Survey 2005 ... - Measure DHS

Practically all never-married women age 15-24 reported that they have never had sexual
intercourse. Only 4 percent of never-married men age 15-24 reported ever having had sex. The proportion
of never-married young men who have ever had sex increases with age, from one percent of the 15-17
year-olds to 13 percent of the 23-24 year-olds. Note that the data in Table 7.4 are limited to never-married
youth, while the data in Table 7.2 include all youth regardless of marital status. Since a lower percentage
of never-married youth have had sexual intercourse than have married youth, percentages of youth having
had sexual intercourse are lower among the never-married population than among the total youth
population.
Six percent of urban young men report having had premarital sex and three percent of rural men
report having had premarital sex. Seven percent of never-married youth in the South report ever having
had premarital sex, while only 3 and 1 percent of men, respectively, in the North and Central regions
report ever having had sexual intercourse.
7.7 HIGHER-RISK SEX AND CONDOM USE AMONG YOUTH
The most common means of transmission of HIV is through unprotected sex with an infected
person. To prevent HIV/AIDS transmission, it is therefore important to practice safer sex, primarily
through the recommended “ABC” method (abstinence, being faithful to one uninfected partner, and
condom use). Table 7.5 shows the proportion of young people who engaged in higher-risk sex in the
previous 12 months and the extent to which they used condoms in higher-risk sexual encounters. In this
context, higher-risk sex refers to sex with a non-marital, non-cohabiting partner, that is, sex with someone
who is neither a spouse nor a live-in partner. All premarital sex by definition is higher-risk sex.
Among women who reported having had sex in the year prior to the survey, less than 1 percent
engaged in higher-risk sex. There is almost no variation in the percentage of women engaged in higher
risk sexual activity. The number of women reporting having engaged in higher-risk sex is too few to
report on condom use during higher-risk sex.
Among sexually active young men aged 15-24 years, 21 percent engaged in higher-risk sexual
activity in the 12 months preceding the survey.
A higher proportion of men aged 15-19 engage in higher-risk sex than those age 20-24 (52 versus
16 percent), simply because a larger proportion of men in their early 20s are married. By definition, all
sexually active youth who are not married engage in higher-risk sex.
Higher-risk sexual intercourse is higher among urban men than rural men (53 percent versus 17
percent) and among those living in the South (38 percent) than in the North (13 percent) and the Central
region (12 percent). Higher-risk sex among young men also increases with increasing education and
increasing wealth status. By education, the percentage of young men engaged in higher-risk sex increases
from 11 percent among those with primary education to 80 percent among those with more than
secondary education. Two out of three young men who did engage in higher-risk sex report having used a
condom the last time they had higher-risk sex.
74 | Youth and HIV-AIDS