Over five hundred teenage girls have undergone Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in West Pokot County since Covid-19 cases started being reported. This comes even as a 12 year old girl from Tapach ward is fighting for her life at Kapenguria County hospital after undergoing the FGM cut on Saturday.
An FGM Activist who is also Director of Irep Foundation that advocates for girls’ right in West Pokot County Ms Domtillah Chesang expressed fears that the cases will go increase because of the prevailing pandemic.
Chesang noted that more than one hundred FGM cases have been reported in the last two weeks.
She said that the prevalence rate of FGM in the County is 74% more than the national figure of 21%.
Chesang said a reason for the upsurge of the cases is that many girls in the villages are idle, and people have turned to FGM as a source of income. Chesang noted that Tapach is leading with over 300 cases of FGM and that girls in the villages are suffering in silence and need urgent medical attention.
Anti FGM Board representative Nicholas Songok said that it’s disgusting for parents to take advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic and make girls undergo the cut. “They should understand the dangers of FGM. Girls overbleed and they can die or get other complications.”
