At least 116 countries, including the US, allow children under 18-years-old to get married, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center.

The analysis includes data on 198 countries and territories from the US State Department and United Nations. In 153 nations, the age of 18 marks adulthood and is a necessary requirement for folks to wed. However, many countries have exceptions to the rule.

Iraq, Jamaica, and Uruguay all permit children to get married with their parents' consent. And in 38, there are different age minimums for men and women.

Meanwhile, in the US, there are several states that set no minimum age for minors to wed if the female is pregnant. And every state allows children under 18 to marry if they meet specific requirements.

In July, Virginia recently replaced a law that allowed 13-year-old girls or younger to get married if they were pregnant and had parental consent. The Department of Health estimates that 4,500 children were married in the state between 2004 and 2013.

Jeanne Smoot, a lawyer at the Tahirih Justice Center, told The Guardian that the exceptions don’t exist to help children but to remove accountability from adults. She added that a young teenager’s pregnancy “should not have been looked at as grounds to grant a marriage license but evidence that she’s at risk.”

Source: The Independent