KEY POINTS:
About 45 new cases of child abuse come to the attention of social workers at Child, Youth and Family every day.
And police around the country currently have about 2000 cases to solve.
Stories like the horrific death of Nia Glassie and other helpless children have shocked the
nation, but they represent only a fraction of the abuse which continues to happen daily behind closed doors.
In the 2006/07 year, Child, Youth and Family investigated 16,201 cases of confirmed child abuse and neglect - a figure that broken down equates to an average of nearly 45 new cases each day.
Some of this abuse is so serious that children are ending up in hospital every week.
Many of the most serious cases are shaken baby syndrome - an abuse that frequently reveals itself in the form of lifeless infants who have retinal haemorrhaging and some degree of brain injury. At Starship hospital, where the country's most seriously injured children end up, doctors see children who are suspected of being shaken roughly every second week.
The vast majority of these cases never make headlines. It is normally only when a child dies that the topic of child abuse is raised in the public consciousness.
Despite this, child abuse around the country is a daily reality - not just for the victims but the police, doctors and social workers dealing with it.
While police don't hold national caseload statistics, the Herald understands that child abuse investigators around the country are working on around 2000 files of varying degrees in seriousness. Nearly 500 of those are in the Auckland Region.
In Waitakere the Child Abuse team has more than 150 files on the go. They range from minor physical assaults to "horrendous multiple violations".
The officer in charge of the unit, Detective Sergeant Megan Goldie, estimates about two-thirds of the cases are sexual.
A handful of the cases include young babies who have as yet unexplained serious injuries. Some are life-threatening.
Among the serious sexual cases there is a young girl who has been sexually abused by her father more than 300 times.
In Counties Manukau, the busiest district in the country, two child abuse teams juggle an average of 40 cases each month - that's just over one new file every day. They currently have around 170 files on the go.
In the year ended June 2008, Counties Manukau had dealt with 533 child abuse offences, a figure which is up by more than 110 on the previous year.
"There has been an increase over the last seven years in referrals or complaints," said Crime Services Manager Detective Inspector John Tims. He says the increase is not necessarily a bad thing. "That's a positive from my perspective in that people feel comfortable in coming and talking to the police.
"Each year it's a similar type of offending. We get a small percentage of physical assaults and then we get a large percentage of sexual assaults."
Wilful neglect and ill treatment - things like kids not going to school, not being clothed properly or having untreated health issues - only make up a small percentage of the statistics as Mr Tims said those tend to be handled by CYF.
Serious cases, like shaken babies, come in pretty regularly. "I would say every eight weeks we would deal with a shaken baby investigation."
On the North Shore - where the demographics are vastly different to Counties Manukau - the Child Abuse Team holds about 50 files. About eight fit into the serious category.
Auckland is busier with around 120 files of varying degrees on the go at the moment. The Auckland team are based at Puawaitahi - a specialist child abuse assessment centre involving Starship, Police and CYF.
The centre, which was opened in 2002 in a building adjacent to Starship, sees around 2100 patients each year - roughly six new cases of abuse each day.
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