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Parents responsible for most child abuse cases

TheCopenhagenPost
June 27th, 2016


This article is more than 8 years old.

Statistics from the nation’s children’s homes show abuse is too often home-grown

Most child abuse starts at home claim new figures (photo: blueMix)

Children who wind up in one of Denmark’s five children’s homes have often endured violence at the hands of their own parents. Figures from the Social and Interior Ministry show that fathers are guilty of the abuse in 45 percent of cases and the mother culpable in 24 percent.

The statistics from the children’s homes were collected and reported by the national board Socialstyrelsen.

“The country’s five children’s homes must first and foremost gently help children who have been exposed to violence and abuse,” Karen Ellemann, the social and interior minister, told DR Nyheder.

“But the knowledge that the homes are collecting can be used to help us be better and faster at preventing and stopping violence against children.”

Cases increasing
A total of 1,086 children had their cases handled at a children’s home in 2015. According to the ministry, that was a marked increase on the previous year.


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”