This article is from page 4 of the 2006-08-25 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
THE HEALTH Board in Clare investigated 448 reported cases of child abuse in 2004 and in 33 of those cases, experts could not say whether the abuse had taken place.
The latest available figures show that the then Mid Western Health Board were called in to examine 448 reports that children living in their area were being abused.
The board investigated a little over a quarter of those cases in 2004 and by the end of the year, 307 investigations were still on-going.
In 98 cases, the abuse was confirmed and in ten cases, investigators were able to say that no abuse had occurred.
Thirty three of the reported cases were described as “inconclusive”.
The figures for this area were not as high as those in the Eastern Regional Health Authority, where 1,301 cases were reported, or the Midlands Heath Authority, which probed 1,564 reports.
But they were higher than North Eastern Health Board figures, which showed 353 cases reported and the North Western Health Board, which looked into 301 cases.
The number of cases still under investigation at the end of the year here was relatively high, with the board still investigating almost three-quarters of all cases reported to them.
This was in comparison with the neighbouring Southern Health Board, which completed nine-tenths of the investigations before them.
Nationally, less than half of all the 6,188 cases reported were concluded in that year, with wide variations in the number of cases tackled in the various regions and in the number of cases in which a conclusion could be drawn.
Barnardos’ director of child advocacy, Norah Gibbons, said the varied status of cases in each of the HSE regions supported the organisation’s belief that children did not get equal treatment.
“We have been concerned about inconsistencies in the system for a long time.
“It is hardly surprising that things are not being dealt with, given the inconsistencies that are there, especially in staffing and how different people deal with cases,” she said.
The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children chief, Paul Gilligan said that “because of the high numbers of abuse cases being reported in the media, many people mistakenly think that the majority of those who have been abused do report it.
“But this is not the case,” he said.