Online Pressroom

Governor Proclaims April Child Abuse Prevention Month

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Dwayne Depp, 859-225-8879

Ddepp@pcaky.org

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Prevention Pays!

Federal Report Shows Drop in Child Maltreatment

The United States Department of Health and Human Services recently reported a decrease in the number of U.S. children suffering from abuse or neglect. In 2008, the rate of child maltreatment dropped to the lowest level since the nineties. The estimated numbers of victimized children dropped sharply, from 903,000 in 2006 to 772,000 in 2008. However, abuse related fatalities continued to rise nationwide.

In Kentucky, rates of substantiated child maltreatment have mirrored the national trend. During Fiscal year 2006, 15,566 children were confirmed to be victims of child abuse or neglect. This number

decreased slightly in 2009 to 14,731 child victims of child abuse or neglect.

Child welfare experts have attributed this decrease in maltreatment rates to an increase in awareness and a shift in societal attitudes toward abuse over the course of the last decade. When provided with education, services and appropriate supervision, the vast majority of potentially abusive caregivers can learn to safely care for their children. “We, as a nation, must come together to support families and nurture children to prevent abuse for this generation as well as for generations to come” said Jill Seyfred, Executive Director, Prevent Child Abuse Kentucky, “Preventing abuse and neglect by supporting families and raising awareness just makes sense.”

Preventing abuse and neglect also makes good fiscal sense. According to an economic impact study, released in 2008 by Prevent Child Abuse America and the Pew Charitable Trusts, the estimated costs of

child abuse and neglect to society is nearly $104 billion in 2007. The pervasive and long-lasting effects of abuse include more than $33 billion in direct costs for foster care services, hospitalization, mental

health treatment and law enforcement. Indirect costs of over $70 billion include loss of productivity, as well as expenditures related to chronic health problems, special education, and the criminal justice

system.

“By working together to raise awareness, offering support and providing families with connections to the resources they need to be successful, we will continue to see rates of maltreatment decline,” said Seyfred.

Further, Seyfred added “educational campaigns, such as those offered by Prevent Child Abuse Kentucky, and statewide awareness will continue to positively influence societal attitudes toward abuse and neglect as well.”

The devastating effects of child maltreatment affect us all, if not by a personal connection than by impacting your wallet. To learn more about how you can get involved in your community, please log on

to www.pcaky.org or contact Prevent Child Abuse Kentucky at 1-800-CHILDREN (800-244-5373).

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Prevent Child Abuse Kentucky is a statewide child abuse prevention organization located in Lexington. They offer public

education campaigns, programs and advocacy aimed at preventing the abuse and neglect of Kentucky’s children. Contact them at

1-800-CHILDREN 24 hours a day/7 days a week.

Please take a moment to view our 2010 PSA!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Kentucky Can Do Better – Stopping Child Abuse Deaths

Too often, the simple joys of a child’s life in central Kentucky, that many of us take for granted in our own families, are far beyond the reach of even our closest neighbors.

Occurrences of child abuse and neglect in Kentucky are all too common.Let us not forget, Wesley Mullins, the 6-year old who died allegedly at the hands of his abuser.In August 2007, while visiting his grandfather, Wesley was allegedly sexual abused and murdered at the hands of 51-year old Lewis “Buck” Ballard in an effort to keep the boy from disclosing the abuse.Cases such as this remind us all that this nation and our state need to focus more on protecting its children.

In 1909, President Theodore Roosevelt held the first White House summit on children. Though 100 Octobers have come since then, we still have far to go to ensure the health, safety and well-being of our nation’s kids. The rate of child abuse and neglect deaths in the U.S. is much higher than in other rich democracies– including Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom.

Tragically, thousands of children die each year in the U.S. at the hands of family members or others living with them. A new report just out from the Every Child Matters Education Fund shows that more than 10,000 children in the U.S. died from abuse and neglect from 2001 to 2007. In contrast, the number of American soldiers killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is approaching 5,000.

Where is the outrage about the senseless deaths of our youngest citizens? What are we doing to stop it?

While child abuse and neglect deaths total about five a day in the U.S., experts believe the real number may be as much as 50 percent higher due to inconsistent record-keeping and different definitions of abuse and neglect in the states.In the state of Kentucky, 41 children died as a direct result of substantiated child abuse or neglect as stated in the Every Child Matters Report.This earned Kentucky the number one spot in the nation at a rate of 4.09 deaths per 100,000 children.

Across the nation, we need to do more to support child protection workers – the first line of defense in protecting children in high-risk situations. Their hands are often tied, because they lack the resources, support and training they need to successfully do their job. Caseloads in some jurisdictions are as high as 60 or more, even though national standards recommend 12 or fewer cases per worker to ensure that at-risk children receive the attention they need.

We know a great deal about preventing abuse and neglect and stopping related fatalities. When provided with services and appropriate supervision, the vast majority of potentially abusive parents can learn to safely care for their children. And many abused children who get help are resilient enough to overcome their history. But for many, the outcome is predictable: when childhood goes wrong, adulthood goes wrong, and the sad story of abuse, including death, repeats itself from one generation of troubled families to the next.

While it’s too late to help the children already killed, we can honor their memories by vowing to protect every child in danger. We can overcome inadequate funding and wide variations in capacity among states, by enacting federal policy committed to protecting children no matter where they live.

Child abuse and neglect are national concerns that deserve national solutions. Through the introduction of the We Can Do Better campaign, groups are coming together to raise awareness and press our nation’s lawmakers to develop and fund solutions that will save children’s lives. Among them are providing more support for the stressed families in which abuse and neglect are more likely to occur, modifying current confidentiality laws to allow greater public understanding every time a child dies, standardizing the way states define abuse and neglect, and providing the funding needed to adequately support child protection services.

To protect America’s children is to safeguard the future of the country.It will take a forward-thinking President and Congress to again make it a national priority. People here in Kentucky need to speak up tomake sure Washington knows just how important this problem is – including raising it with our own elected officials. Together, we can reduce needless tragedy, and give children the safe, healthy future they deserve.