The prevalence of
Gardnerella vaginalis
in the genital tract of 253 pregnant Nigerian women was 17.0 % (43). The highest prevalence occurred among women aged 16-20 years (26%) while the lowest occurred among those aged 31-35 years (13%). Women aged 30 years and below had an overall prevalence of 18.2% while those above 30 years had a prevalence rate of 12.7%. This difference was not significant (c2 = 0.66; p = 0.42). There was a dedine in the prevalence rate of G. vaginalis with increasing gestational age being 18.2% for pre-term gestational age (i.e., below 37 weeks) and 12.0% for term gestational age (37-42 weeks), although the difference was also not significant (χ
22 = 1.13; p > 0.5). Similarly, a non-significant decline in the prevalence of Gardnerella vaginalis occurred with increasing parity from 19% in the primigravida to 6.5% in the grandmultipara (χ
22 =2.81; p = 0.246). No definite trend occurred in the prevalence of G. vaginalis for social class (χ
24 =3.2 p = 0.525). The pattern of prevalence of Gardnerella vaginalis in the genital tract in pregnancy suggests an indirect relationship with pregnancy sexuality, which needs to be corroborated with further larger studies.
