Background: Emergency situations, including epidemics, increase incidence of violence against women, especially intimate partner violence (IPV). This paper describes specific scenarios of IPV reported by women during the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria to provide insight for policy and programmatic efforts. Methods: This paper draws on seven de-identified case reports from organisations serving women experiencing IPV as well as media coverage of IPV cases in Nigeria, between April and May, 2020. Results: In most cases, reports identified IPV that was occurring prior to the lockdown, but increased in severity or involved new types of violence during the lockdown. The case scenarios included descriptions of many forms of IPV commonly reported, including physical, economic, psychological and sexual violence, often concurrently. Several women also reported threats of being thrown out of their homes by perpetrators, which threatens women’s ability to protect themselves from exposure to COVID-19, but could also leave women stranded with no access to transportation, social services, or other resources during the lockdown. Several women also reported IPV that involved custody of children, as well as IPV that disrupted women’s income generation. IPV was also reported in relation to economic stressors associated with the lockdown. Reports highlight how the lockdown disrupted women’s social support, hindering accessibility of formal and informal sources of help. Conclusion: The lockdowns in Nigeria may have inadvertently placed women already experiencing partner violence at risk for experiencing more severe violence, new challenges to cope with violent experiences, and other forms of violence, including violence that used the lockdown as a way to threaten women’s security and ability to protect themselves from the virus. Hence, there is need for innovative approaches to support victims, with emphasis on ways in which perpetrators of IPV may be using the threat of COVID-19 to further gain power and control over partners.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) occurs in high proportions among young women, with long-lasting adverse health and social outcomes. Recent research findings suggest that experiencing economic vulnerability may influence the ways in which young women experience or are at risk for IPV, including economic abuse. Economic abuse, a form of IPV, involves a partner’s control over money and other economic resources or activities. This study explored economic vulnerability and IPV, including economic abuse, among young Nigerian women reporting a recent history of IPV. In-depth interviews (n = 25) were conducted with women aged 18–30 years who had experienced IPV in the past year. Women were recruited from community and health facilities in low-income neighborhoods of Ibadan, Nigeria. A semi-structured interview guide was used to gather data on women’s economic vulnerability (e.g., food security, living situation, employment/education opportunities, family financial support, economic independence) and experiences of IPV. An analysis was conducted using a thematic analysis approach. The coding scheme was based on interview protocols, adding open codes from emergent themes identified in the interviews. On average, participants were 21 years old, most had children (68%) and reported to be cohabitating with a male partner (56%), and 48% had less than a secondary level of education. Among the emergent themes, women reported economic vulnerability as being financially dependent on a male partner for basic needs. Among this sample, economic vulnerability was exacerbated by limited education, training, and work opportunities, and a disproportionate burden of household labor. Economic vulnerability precipitated all forms of IPV, including economic abuse, as well as sexual and pregnancy coercion. Economic abuse was reported to occur when male partners controlled household finances and denied women adequate allowance to purchase household food, including food for children. Findings from this qualitative study suggest that interventions promoting educational and employment opportunities may be critical to reducing financial reliance on male partners and young women’s vulnerability to economic abuse and other forms of IPV. More research and programmatic work are needed on food deprivation as a form of economic abuse affecting women and their children.

Background: Folate deficiency is associated with poor pregnancy outcomes and is one of the most common vitamin deficiencies in women, especially those of reproductive age. Aims: This study aimed to determine the level of knowledge and uptake of folic acid among a sample of pregnant women. Method: A descriptive cross-sectional study, using a structured questionnaire, was carried out among 300 pregnant women attending antenatal clinics in one hospital in Oluyoro, Ibadan, Nigeria. Findings: All participants claimed to have heard of folic acid and major source of information was health workers (77.3%). Only 11.8% knew that folic acid can prevent birth defects and just 22.7% knew the best time to start using folic acid. Almost all the women (98.3%) reported using folic acid in the current pregnancy, of whom 54.2% used it as prescribed. Education (P=0.002), marital status (P=0.001), plan of pregnancy (P=0.022), and maternal age (P=0.046) were significantly associated with knowledge of folic acid. Employment status was significantly associated with uptake of folic acid (P=0.004). Conclusions: In this study, knowledge and uptake of folic acid was low among young, single and low education status women. Campaigns promoting periconceptional use of folic acid will be very useful in reaching women of child-bearing age particularly those pregnant and not registered for antenatal care.

Background: The peculiarity in Nigerians’ demographic, socio-economic and cultural pattern necessitated the need to explore potential COVID-19 vaccine acceptance. This study investigated the determinants of willingness to receive COVID-19 vaccine in Nigeria. Methods: An online cross-sectional study among the general population in Nigeria. Data were collected using an electronic questionnaire. A total of 368 individuals participated in the research. The outcome variable was willingness to accept COVID-19 vaccine coded as “Yes=1 and No=0.” Basic socio-demographic information of participants and other information related to COVID-19 were obtained. Stata MP 14 was used for the statistical analysis. Descriptive statistics were presented, test of association were carried out using chi square and a binary logistic regression was used to assess the determinants of willingness to accept COVID-19 vaccine. All analyses were performed at 5% level of significance. Results: The mean age of the respondents was 29.4 + 9.65 years. Majority of the study participants were female (58.9%), Yoruba (74.7%) and dwellers of urban area (68.5%). Also, 85.6% have attained tertiary level of education. Two-fifth (40.5%) of respondent reported their willingness to take the COVID-19 if made available. Majority (69.8%) of those that are willing to take the vaccine would prefer a live attenuated form and 39.6% would prefer the vaccine administered intramuscularly. Age group≥40 years (AOR: 5.20, CI: 1.02- 26.41), currently married (AOR: 2.81, CI: 1.05 – 7.53) and susceptibility to COVID 19 infection (AOR: 2.52, CI: 1.21 – 5.26) were associated with likelihood of willingness to accept COVID-19 vaccine. Conclusion: Despite the fact that majority were at risk of COVID-19 infection, willingness to receive COVID-19 vaccine was low among Nigerians. Level of maturity in terms of age and marriage as well as susceptibility to COVID-19 infection increased the likelihood of accepting COVID-19 infection. In Furtherance, younger ones, unmarried and non-susceptible individual may require more efforts tailored towards enrichment of understanding about the importance of COVID-19 vaccine in other to improve the acceptance of COVID-19 vaccine in Nigeria.

This study determined the past-year prevalence of physical, sexual and psychological intimate partner violence (IPV) and associated factors among young women in urban slums and non-slums of Ibadan, Nigeria.A cross-sectional study, using a multistage cluster sampling method was used to select 1050 ever-partnered young women aged between 18 and 24 years from the five Local Government Areas (LGAs) in Ibadan municipal. All localities were classified into slums and non-slums using the UN-Habitat 2003 criterion. Independent variables were respondents' and partners’ characteristics. Dependent variables were physical, sexual and psychological IPV. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression model (α0.05).Prevalence of physical (31.4%, 13.4%), sexual (37.1%, 18.3%), and psychological IPV (58.6%, 31.5%) were significantly higher in the slum than non-slum communities. Multivariate analysis showed that secondary education (aOR:0.45, 95%CI: 0.21 – 0.92) reduced IPV experience while being unmarried (aOR:2.83, 95%CI: 1.28 – 6.26), partner’s alcohol use (aOR:1.97, 95%CI: 1.22 – 3.18), and partner’s relationship with other women (aOR:1.79, 95%CI: 1.10 -2.91) increased IPV experience in slum communities. In non-slum communities, having children (aOR:2.99, 95%CI: 1.05–8.51), non-consensual sexual debut (aOR: 1.88, 95%CI: 1.07–3.31) and witness of abuse in childhood (aOR:1.82: 95%CI: 1.01 – 3.28) increased experience of IPV. Acceptance of IPV and partner’s witness of abuse in childhood increased experience of IPV in both settings.This study confirms that IPV is common among young women in Ibadan, Nigeria, but higher among women in slum communities. Findings also showed different factors associated with IPV in slum and non-slum communities. Therefore, targeted interventions for each urban stratum are recommended.