THE NUMBER OF ABUSED CHILDREN
IN IOWA DECLINES IN 2006

Available as a PDF Document.

The Iowa Department of Human Services determined that 14,042 children suffered abuse in 2006 – a decline of almost 7 percent from 2005, when DHS found that 15,060 children were abused. The 2005 figures set a record high for child abuse in Iowa, following four years of much greater than average levels of child abuse in Iowa (see Chart 1).

According to DHS records, approximately 9,640 children, on aver­age, suffered abuse annually from 1994 through 1999. In 2000, these figures began a steep climb, go­ing from 10,822 abused children in 2000 to 12,793 abused children in 2001, 12,295 children in 2002, 14,936 children in 2003, 14,499 children in 2004, and 15,060 in 2005.

CHART 1

Number of Iowa Children Found to Be Abused, 1994-2006

Please note that PCA Iowa uses the “duplicate” abused children numbers from the Iowa DHS. These numbers count each time a particular child is abused. DHS also releases figures for “unique” abused children. These numbers count a child only once as abused, even if the child suffers abuse on multiple occasions. In 2006, there were 13,027 “unique” abused children.

The Types of Child Abuse  

Table 1 lists the number and types of abuse that DHS found in 2006. Most child abuse in Iowa involved the denial of critical care, commonly called neglect. In 2006, DHS determined that there were 15,798 confirmed instances of denial of critical care – 77.3 percent of all child abuse. This is by far the largest number of confirmed neglect cases ever.

DHS also determined that there were 2,037 cases of physical injury (10.0 percent of all abuse). DHS founded 839 cases of sexual abuse (4.1 percent of abuse) – the lowest number of founded sexual abuse cases in more than twenty years.

The 2006 DHS figures detail the continuing high number of children affected by parental or other caretaker use or manufacturing of illegal drugs. A total of 1,481 abuse cases (7.2 percent of all confirmed or founded abuse) involved the presence of illegal drugs in a child’s body as a result of the actions of a parent or other care­taker. DHS also determined that 107 children were present while their parents or other caretakers were involved in manufacturing methamphetamine – a figure that represented less than one percent of all confirmed child abuse in 2006.

A new category of abuse first reported for a full year in 2006 involved a child’s parent or caretaker knowingly co-habiting with a sex offender who was not the person’s spouse or the child’s parent or guardian. DHS found 143 cases where this new type of abuse occurred, mostly in the first part of the year. According to DHS, court rulings have restricted the application of this new category, with many cases where a sex offender is living with a child now being cited as denial of critical care.

TABLE 1

Number and Types of Child Abuse, 2006

The Rise in Child Abuse

Table 2 details the figures for the major types of Iowa child abuse from 2001 to 2006. Most of the rise in child abuse over that time resulted from significant increases in two categories of abuse. First, confirmed cases of denial of critical care (see Inset) rose by almost 5,000 cases from 2001 to 2006, which was a 43.9 percent increase. Second, the number of instances where authorities confirmed the presence of an illegal drug in a child’s body more than doubled from 2001 to 2006 – increasing from 678 cases in 2001 to 1,481 cases in 2006.

By contrast, the number of confirmed cases of physical and sexual abuse declined by more than one-third from 2001 to 2006. In 2006, there were 1,128 fewer confirmed cases of physical injury and 489 fewer instances of sexual abuse than in 2001. These two categories of child abuse represented 27.5 percent of all abuse in 2001 but only 14.1 percent of all abuse in 2006.

In 2001, the Iowa Legislature was the first in the nation to add a new category of child abuse for cases where a child’s parent or other caretaker was involved in manufacturing a dangerous drug in a child’s presence. In 2006, DHS found that 107 children were present when their parent or other caretaker manufactured meth. This was the lowest number of cases for the period of 2001 to 2006.

TABLE 2

Types of Child Abuse in Iowa, 2001-06

* Figures for July 1 to December 31, 2001 only

The Age of Child Victims

In 2006, 49.6 percent of the victims of abuse were less than six years old. This continues an overall trend where an increasing proportion of abuse victims were less than six years old.

TABLE 3

Percent of Abuse Victims Who Were

Less than Six Years Old

Disparity in County Rates of Abused Children

CHART 2

Counties with Lowest and Highest Rates of Child Abuse, 2006

Conclusion

The decline in DHS child figures in 2006 were the most substantial in the last two decades. Nonetheless, the number of abused children in 2006 was still the fourth highest ever and far above the much lower figures for the 1990s.

In his analysis of the 2006 figures, DHS’s Director Kevin Concannon was cautious about predicting a continuing downturn in Iowa’s rate of child abuse. Director Concannon noted that many of the indicators associated with higher risks of child abuse remain high, including child poverty rates, lack of health insurance, illegal drug usage, and single parenting. Until some or all of risk factors like these decline, child abuse are likely to remain high.

Available as a PDF Document.

For general comments and questions, please contact:

Prevent Child Abuse Iowa
505 Fifth Avenue, Suite 900
Des Moines, Iowa 50309
Phone: 515-244-2200
Toll Free: 800-237-1815
Fax: 515-280-7835
Email:

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