Over 4000 cases of child abuse reported in 2018

The Child Care and Protection Agency (CCPA) has revealed that at the end of October 2018, it received and processed a total of 4,352 cases of child abuse.

Director of the agency, Ann Greene told News Room that the number of cases has put a strain on the CCPA since it does not have the manpower to handle such a high volume.

As such, the agency has solicited the assistance of its partner NGOs in investigating reports.

For every child who was taken to the agency last year, Greene said that they did everything in their power to ensure the safety of that child.

“Every child that is abused is exposed to care, is exposed to our psychologist now onboard. Children are now being screened. For the entire 2018 every child that was reported to us or came into our care we had them screened,” the Director said.

Region 10 has the highest number of rate per child reports followed by Region 4. Greene said that most of these reports are sexual abuse and neglect.

The Director said that caseloads are so high that they are unable to process some of the reports even when a child’s parent may have died violently.

The National Multimedia Awareness Child Abuse Campaign was intensified in 2018 with new communication methods and channels for reporting.

The Ministry of Social Protection, Child Care and Protection Agency (CPA) responded to some 3,324 child abuse cases by the end of October 2017, an increase when compared to the same period in 2016 where 3,294 cases were reported.