When Dr. Barbara Knox started to evaluate child abuse data from the past year she noticed an alarming change.
“The cases that are presenting, are presenting inpatient, and it’s the big and the bad,” Knox said. “A serious uptick in cases of abusive head trauma, serious physical abuse.”
An increase in severe injuries to children that require hospitalization.
Knox is the medical director of Alaska Child Abuse Response and Evaluation Services (Alaska CARES), a clinic at Providence Alaska Medical Center that focuses on children who have suffered from abuse.
Many kids in Alaska are just now starting to return to in-person learning after the pandemic forced school buildings to close nearly a year ago. And as students return, child welfare advocates are assessing the impact of the pandemic on child abuse.
The number of reports to the Office of Children’s Services decreased by as much as 30% in some months of 2020, and the overall number of evaluations that Alaska CARES completed also saw a slight decrease compared to 2019. But, the number of times an Alaska CARES staff person visited a child who needed to be hospitalized for severe injuries as a result of suspected abuse skyrocketed by 220% in the last year.
“This absolutely reflects an increase in serious physical abuse and neglect cases,” Knox said.
The lower reporting rate and the spike in severe cases is likely due to a combination of factors, most of them exacerbated by the pandemic, Knox said.
Things like increased isolation, stress on families from financial instability, and school closures, which limited kid’s contact with adults who could help them.
Schools are the single largest source of child abuse reports, according to OCS.
Additionally, OCS is seeing the number of children in foster care balloon, and children are staying in foster care for longer periods of time.
Kim Guay, acting Director of OCS, said the pandemic “sent us for a loop.” Family courts closed, social workers’ ability to do home studies and home visits were disrupted, and the pandemic made it hard for the office to investigate suspected cases of abuse, especially in rural areas. The issues just compounded over time Guay said.
“How do we assess safety? We have requirements where you have to see the child that’s in foster care face-to-face every single month. Well, how do you do that when you don’t have PPEs to go to the home?” Guay said. That’s just one example of many logistical obstacles the pandemic created. There are also other factors to consider that have kept some children in the system. “There’s so much stress going on families lives, is now the appropriate time to put the children back home?” Guay said.
It’s a multi-pronged issue that Guay said OCS is continuing to work through.
Now, as children are returning to school, Guay said she expects to see the number of child abuse reports go up as children interact more with school staff. But advocates stress that’s to be expected because reporting typically dips when students are away from school, such as during summer break, and rebounds when they return in the fall.
School staff, like counselors, across the state are preparing to support the transitions back to in-person learning, according to Elizabeth Congdon-McGee, the acting executive director of the Alaska School Counselor Association and the counselor at Whaley School in Anchorage
“I do believe the mental health and the trauma is going to be coming in our doors full force,” Congdon-McGee said. “Because we don’t know what has been in our kids lives. We see them on a screen, but we don’t know what’s behind that screen.”
Knox said families who may be overwhelmed or struggling should reach out to their medical provider or the Office of Children’s Services to get help finding the resources they might need.
Reach reporter Mayowa Aina at maina@alaskapublic.org
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'It's the big and the bad,': Advocates see 220% increase in severe injuries to Alaska children in 2021 - Alaska Public Media News
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