Abuse, neglect seen in 30,000 newborns
ATLANTA (AP) - April 3, 2008 The study focused on children younger than 1, and found nearly a
third were one week old or younger when the abuse or neglect
occurred.
Most of these cases involved neglect, and may in part reflect
families without health insurance that are not getting adequate
care for their children, said David Finkelhor, who is familiar with
the data but was not involved in the study. Finkelhor directs the
Crimes against Children Research Center at the University of New
Hampshire.
"It's not primarily kids being hit, but parents showing signs
of not being able to really care for their kids," he said.
The researchers counted more than 91,000 infant victims of abuse
and neglect in the period Oct. 1, 2005 to Sept. 30, 2006.
The information came from a national database of cases verified
by protective services agencies in 45 states, the District of
Columbia and Puerto Rico.
Other studies have looked at national child abuse and neglect
cases, but this is believed to be the first to focus on infants,
said study co-author Rebecca Leeb, of the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention.
The results mirror what a study in Canada found, Leeb said.
The 91,000 infants were age 1 year or younger. About 30,000 of
those cases were newborns aged one week or younger.
"It is a particularly vulnerable group," said Leeb, a CDC
epidemiologist.
"We were struck by the fact there was a clustering of
maltreatment with the very, very early age group."
Only about 13 percent of the newborn cases were counted as
physical abuse, meaning the large majority involved neglect.
Federal officials define neglect as a failure to meet a child's
basic needs, including housing, clothing, feeding and access to
medical care.
The counted cases did not include new parents stumbling their
way through breast-feeding or making other rookie mistakes.
"Things like abandonment and newborn drug addiction would
qualify as neglect, not things like parents learning how to be
parents," Leeb said.
Medical professionals identified about 65 percent of the
maltreated newborns to protective services staff. The others came
from law enforcement, relatives, friends, neighbors and from
protective services staff.
Finkelhor has written reports from the same database the CDC
researchers used. He said the neglect cases include situations in
which medical professionals conclude that a child got sick or
didn't correctly develop because parents didn't get recommended
medical care. Those cases were not necessarily life-threatening, he
added.
The CDC collaborated on the study with the federal
Administration for Children and Families.
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On the Net:
The CDC publication: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr
