Socio-demographic determinants of sexual inactivity among reproductive married women in Bangladesh: Evidence of BDHS data 2022

Background: Sexual intercourse is integral part of physical well-being health especially in married couple's life. Unhappiness and life dissatisfaction can be positively influenced by sexual inactivity. Sexual inactivity has recently been subject to increased scrutiny from public health perspectives. This project targeted to examine the socio-demographic determinants of sexual inactivity in Bangladeshi women of childbearing age. Method: Data from the most recent Bangladesh Health and Demographic Survey (BDHS) conducted in 2022 was utilized. Our study was considered a two-stage stratified sampling technique and cross-sectional design. Sexual inactivity was defined as no sexual frequency among reproductive women in the last month. The analysis included 14650 reproductive women aged 15–49 years. The associations between sexual inactivity and exposure variables were evaluated using the Pearson's Chi-square test, and the prediction model considered the multivariable logistic regression. Results: The prevalence of sexual inactivity among reproductive women in Bangladesh was 6.72% (95% CI: 0.93-0.94). The likelihood of sexual inactivity was more pointedly among married women who live in the Dhaka region, Khulna region, and Sylhet region [p<0.05] compared to the Chittagong region. Women who had household heads [p<0.001] were significantly less likely to report sexual inactive than those who had no household heads. The odds of sexual inactivity were lower among women who had the age of ≥40 years [p<0.001] compared to their counterparts. Women whose height below <164cm were [p<0.001] had significantly higher chances of sexual inactivity. Sexually inactive significantly higher odds of being women who had a husband/partner are age of 30- 40 years [p=0.036]. Unemployment husband/partner's (p=0.014) were less likely to be sexually inactive. Conclusion: Demographic factors such as women's age significantly affect sexual inactivity (SI) among the women in their reproductive age in Bangladesh. To overcome SI problem government and nongovernmental organization must take effective measures to improve women education level, reproductive health-care service, including sexual health of childbearing age.