In many U.S. states, children can legally marry at an earlier age than they can consent to sex, leading to situations where sex between spouses may be a criminal act. Some states exempt sex between married spouses from their definition of statutory rape, which may create perverse incentives for child marriage, according to researchers from McGill University.

Their findings, published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, show that child marriages violated statutory rape laws in 14 states.

Dr. Alissa Koski, of the Institute for Health and Social Policy, and the Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Occupational Health, discussed the state of child marriage in Canada on CBC Radio.

Canada is at the forefront of global efforts to end child marriage abroad. Yet this practice remains legal and persists across the country. In Canada, more than 3,600 marriage certificates were issued to children, usually girls, under the age of 18 between 2000 and 2018, according to a new study from researchers at McGill University. In recent years, an increasing number of child marriages have been common-law unions.