The United States Department of Health and Human Services recently published a study about child abuse based on 716,303 cases from the year 2009. One of the most interesting findings is that nearly 90% of all child abuse is happening within the family, in 80% of all cases the perpetrator is even the kid’s mother or father.
This is nothing new. Among others a similar study from Canada (see page 49) came to the same conclusion. But it’s still worth pointing out that the common notion that “you can’t let your kids play outside anymore nowadays” is rubbish. Not only because crime rate are dropping dramatically since 30 years but also because, as these studies show, most child abuse is happening within the family anyway.