As more agencies turn their searchlight on sexual abuse of the country's young girls, there is an increasingly loud call for more emphasis to be placed on boys who are victims of sexual abuse. According to Everton Hannam, chairman of the National Parent-Teacher Association in Jamaica, he was very disappointed that there appears to be no overwhelming drive towards identifying and assisting male victims.
"Parents and teachers within the organisation may be doing this on a one-to-one basis or in small groups but it is being done away from the headlines. And one of the reasons why it appears almost invisible is because of the absence of statistics and data," charged Hannam.
He said the huge outcry in the case of girls is driven by the numbers which show more cases of sexual abuse of girls being reported. Some 12,449 cases of sexual abuse of girls were reported to the Office of the Children's Registry between 2007 and 2013, while 892 cases of the sexual abuse of boys were reported over the same period.
Hannam charged that there is a high visibility of the groups providing assistance of various kinds to abused girls and their families, but when boys are involved in cases of sexual abuse assistance is usually under the radar.
[For more go to http://jamaica-gleaner.com/art...males-under-reported]
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