According to the United Nations Population Fund, the data only encompasses about a fifth of the world's countries, with Africa accounting for more than half of them.
The findings, however, paint a disturbing image of the state of bodily autonomy for millions of women and girls who do not have the power to make decisions about their bodies and futures without fear or abuse," according to the study.
Just 55% of girls and women in the 57 countries will determine whether or not to have sex, whether or not to use contraceptives, and when to seek health care, according to the fund.
The fund’s executive Director Dr. Natalia kanem said, “The denial of bodily autonomy is a violation of women and girls' fundamental human rights that reinforces inequalities and perpetuates violence arising from gender discrimination.”
'The fact that nearly half of women still cannot make their own decisions about whether or not to have sex, use contraception or seek health care should outrage us all.’According to the report, 'My Body Is My Own,' percentages vary across regions.
According to the survey, while 76% of adolescent girls and women in East and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Caribbean can make decisions about sex, contraceptives, and health care, only 50% of adolescent girls and women in Sub-Saharan Africa and Central and South Asia can.
Within countries, there are also variations. According to the survey, less than 10% of teenage girls and women in three countries in Sub-Saharan Africa — Mali, Niger, and Senegal — control all three of these decisions.
The study found that regional differences in attitudes toward the three decisions are less pronounced elsewhere, but they still exist, ranging from 33% to 77 percent in Central and South Asia, 40% to 81 percent in East and Southeast Asia, and 59 percent to 87 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Inconsistencies between countries were also cited by the fund, which is now known as the United Nations' sexual and reproductive health agency.
In Mali, for example, 77% of women make independent or joint contraceptive decisions, but only 22% can do so when it comes to health care, according to the survey.
Just 53% of Ethiopian women can say "no" to sex, but 94% can make contraceptive decisions on their own or with their partners.
Many women are often denied the right to choose the person they marry or the right time to have a child 'because of race, sex, sexual orientation, age, or capacity,' according to Dr.Kanem in the report's forward.
'Real, sustained progress largely depends on uprooting gender inequality and all forms of discrimination, and transforming the social and economic structures that maintain them,' she said.'Men must become allies in this.'