State of World Population 2012 - UNFPA Haiti

Social Affairs, 2009). Data from 15 industrializedcountries between 2006 and 2008 suggest theaverage duration of marriage ranges from 10 to17 years. Additionally, approximately one in fourregistered marriages in countries belonging to theOrganisation for Economic Co-operation andDevelopment is a remarriage.Adults are entering, staying, and endingpartnerships very differently from previousgenerations, and their needs for familyplanning education and services have takenon new characteristics. Family planning policiesand programmes have an opportunity torethink their focus so as not to exclude unmarriedpeople, whether they are never-married,divorced, separated—temporarily or permanently—orwidowed.In both developed and developing countries,social norms—to varying degrees—promoteabstaining from sexual activity until marriage.Despite broader support for comprehensivesex education in many settings, the abstinenceuntil-marriageapproach to family planning cancompromise the effectiveness of in-school sexualityeducation programmes and neglects the sexualhealth needs of single, sexually active adolescentsand young adults. Evidence shows that theabstinence-only-until-marriage style of sexualityeducation is not effective (Kirby, 2008).“Family planning” usually focuses on theneeds of younger married persons, generally themost fertile. Yet a growing number of olderwomen and men have to negotiate contraceptiveuse and protect themselves from sexually transmittedinfections later in life, often after marriage(Organisation for Economic Co-operation andDevelopment, 2010). The desire for sexualrelationships among older people (over age 49)is largely overlooked in policy and programmedesign. This omission compromises the rightsof sexually active elders who wish to protectthemselves from harmful sexual and reproductivehealth outcomes, including higher-risk unintendedpregnancies and protection from sexuallytransmitted infections, including HIV. Meetingtheir family planning needs requires challengingthe pervasive assumption that older people arenot sexually active and do not need to exercisethe right to family planning.Greater numbers of older women and menare entering their late reproductive years assingle, divorced, or widowed, creating a largepopulation of people who are “post-marriage.”Research in Thailand has described the vulnerabilityof older men to HIV (Van Landinghamand Knodel, 2007), but family planning researchhas not touched on this area. The sexual healthneeds of older women and men are oftenneglected because, like adolescence, sex outsidemarriage for pleasure and intimacy challengessocial norms about who should have sex andtContraceptives atthe Egyptian FamilyPlanning Association inAbo Attwa town, nearIsmailiyah.©UNFPA/Matthew CasselTHE STATE OF WORLD POPULATION 201253