The age of opportunity: prevalence of key risk factors among adolescents 10–19 years of age in nine communities in sub-Saharan Africa

Objective: To measure health-related behaviours and risk factors among sub-Saharan African adolescents. Methods: Cross-sectional study in nine communities in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Eswatini, Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania and Uganda between 2015 and 2017. Community-representative samples of males and females 10–19 years of age were selected. All communities used a uniform questionnaire that was adapted from the WHO Global School-based Student Health Survey. Weighted prevalence estimates and 95% confidence intervals were calculated for each indicator and stratified by age and sex using SAS version 9.4. All prevalence estimates were pooled across communities through random-effects meta-analyses in Stata version 14. Results: A total of 8075 adolescents participated in the study. We observed a high prevalence of inadequate fruit consumption (57–63%) and low physical activity (82–90%); a moderate prevalence of inadequate vegetable consumption (21–31%), unprotected last sex (38–45%), age at first sex <15 years (21–28%) and bullying and physical fighting (12–35%); and a low prevalence of mental health risk factors (1–11%) and alcohol and substance use risk factors (0–6%). We observed a moderate to high prevalence of daily soft drink consumption (21–31%) for all adolescents. Among sexually active adolescents 15–19 years, 37% of females reported ever being pregnant and 8% of males reported to have ever made someone pregnant. Bullying (23%) and physical fighting (35%) were more common among younger male adolescents. The prevalence of low mood was generally higher among older (15–19 years) than younger adolescents (10–14 years). The proportion of adolescents reporting alcohol, drug or cigarette use was very small, with the exception of khat use in Ethiopia. Conclusion: Overall, diet and physical activity, violence, sexual and reproductive health, and depression are important risk factors for these sub-Saharan African communities. These findings suggest that more evidence is needed including novel efforts for the collection of sensitive information, as well as a need to move towards community-tailored interventions to reach adolescent populations with varying needs.