Miikkulainen, Alli http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6281-5203
Abdirahman Mohamud, Ibrahim
Aqazouz, Majda
Abdullahi Suleiman, Bishara
Sheikh Mohamud, Omar
Ahmed Mohamed, Abdifatah
Rossi, Rodolfo http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7761-7162
Article History
Received: 28 December 2022
Accepted: 24 July 2023
First Online: 12 August 2023
Declarations
:
: Ethical approvals were received from the Research & Ethical Committee at the Federal Ministry of Health & Human Services in Somalia on 14 February 2022 (MOH&HS/DGO/0185/February/2022), ICRC Ethics Review Board on 16 February 2022 (DP_DIR 21/00005), and SRCS Executive Director on 10 March 2022 (SRCS/MCO/261/2022).Due to the high proportion of early marriage and pregnancy in Somalia, the study population included girls aged 15 years and older. All study participants or their accompanying relative provided informed verbal consent as follows: In case of interviewees younger than 18, an informed consent was collected from an accompanying relative, while the interview would still be done alone to avoid respondent bias. Upon advice of the local authorities, only verbal consent was requested due to high illiteracy rate in Somalia and to protect the identity of the respondent. No names were collected, therefore protecting the identity of participants, and potentially increasing the acceptability of the study. The ICRC Ethics Review Board accepted the approach of verbal informed consent as opposed to a written one. The verbal consent statement is provided in Related files.The study was designed and conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, as required for any study involving human participants.
: Not applicable.
: The authors declare no competing interests.