Protecting Our Children

On Thursday, New York Citys Administration of Children's Services reported that there is an alarming spike this year in the number of kids dying from abuse and neglect in New York and that they are stepping up efforts to stem the increase. The deaths of 58 children from abuse or neglect were reported in the city in the first nine months of this year, compared with 37 such deaths for the same period in 2003, ACS revealed. Some of the deaths were accidental, but most were not. Among those who died in 2004, 29 came from families that already had a history with ACS.

New York, NY (PRWEB) October 10, 2004 -- In June, 2004 New York City Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum reported findings of a 2003 study that 24% percent of cases of child death in which parent abuse or neglect was suspected occurred in City shelters or were shelter related. The Public Advocate's office has received 51 reports from 2003 of cases of non-foster child fatalities in New York City in which abuse and/or neglect was suspected.

Looking at the National statistics, the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) reported an estimated 1,400 child fatalities in 2002. This translates to a rate of 1.98 children per 100,000 children in the general population. Experts believe that the number of child deaths from maltreatment per year may be as high as 5,000.

These numbers should serve as a wake up call to America! The sad news is that child abuse in all of its forms has reached an alarming epidemic. Each year in our country over 3 million children are reported as victims of physical, sexual, verbal and emotional abuse, neglect, abandonment, and death -- and those are only the ones that were reported! Of those 3 million plus kids, over 98,000 children were treated for sexual abuse. The numbers are startling and because child abuse is so underreported, it is estimated that three times the number of reports are the actual number of children who are victims each year.

To add to that, each year almost 1.8 million children are reported missing -- many of them abducted from their own homes and front yards. In the USA, Children are more apt to die from abuse than from accidents. Each year 18,000 children and youth are permanently disabled and 565,000 are seriously injured. Child abuse kills more than 3 children every day in America. One child being hurt or dying from child abuse and neglect is one child too many.

It is time to accelerate awareness for this very public cause and the simple truth is ... we can do a lot to educate the public and expand our efforts to PROTECT children and STRENGTHEN families.

Additionally, we must stop accepting excuses that our caseworkers are overworked and underpaid. Not only must we review the backgrounds of those who are hired as caseworkers, we must help them succeed by training them with college curriculum such as that of the National Child Protection Training Center developed through a parnership with the American Prosecutors Research Institutes with Winona State University. The program is run by Victor Vieth, Director of the Prosecutors Research Institutes National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse and Director of the National Child Protection Training Center at Winona State University. Mr. Vieth also serves as an Advisory Board Member to Love Our Children USA. And, if our Departments of Children Services can find it in their budgets to pay high salaries to employees who can publicize their positive image, then certainly they should be able to find additional monies in their budgets to pay caseworkers higher salaries.

There is an urgency: In the U.S., parenting education is offered only after parents have failed -- children are     placed in foster homes only after they are hurt. This is just temporary relief. We must provide parenting education before parents fail. We must help children before they are irreparably harmed. We can do this by creating education and awareness, advocacy, and prevention initiatives with a strong message about child safety and parenting education, and offering information and resources to parents, childcare givers, and kids who have no place to turn. This will require a new approach through unified community, regional and national initiatives. This is the commitment, passion, and purpose of Love Our Children USA.

Love Our Children USA is the leading national leading grassroots organization that honors, respects and protects children. As a voice for children, we celebrate them and the loving relationship we should with them. Our mission is to stop the cycle that victimizes children. We do this by promoting positive changes in parenting and family attitudes, along with behaviors and prevention strategies through public education campaigns. Love Our Children USA works to empower and support children, teens, parents and families through information, resources, advocacy and online youth mentoring.

For more information, please refer to the web site at www.loveourchildrenusa.org ...or call 888.347.KIDS.

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