Effect of Contraceptive and Reproductive Health Services on Marital Stability among HIV-1 Discordant Couples: Medical Social Work Perspective

Abstract

Marriage and family life remain the bedrock of societies despite social changes that have affected many societal norms and values. Social change also threatens the survival of the family as a social unit including marriage in the context of heterosexual ( male and female) union. One of the modern viral infectious diseases, human immune deciency syndrome (HIV) from an infected person to an uninfected person when not properly managed, degenerates the immune system and leads to Acquired Immuno Suppression Syndrome (AIDS). This infection is further complicated by serodiscordancy, a situation where one partner is HIV positive, and the other is negative. Up to 95% of infections are transmitted via heterosexual contacts. Recently, the Nigerian HIV/AIDS Indicator and Impact Survey (NAIIS) 2019 published by the National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA) showed that about 1.9 million Nigerians live with the infection. The population gure of Nigeria's over 200 million, means there is more effort needed to combat this disease. A combination of qualitative and quantitative methods was used and integrated based on the strengths of both sets to better understand the research problem. We, therefore, explored the effect of one of the components of psychosocial support, in context and tested hypotheses that showed a signicant positive relationship between contraceptive and reproductive health services and marital stability