Fewer children are dying from assualt but numbers of violent teen deaths rise

Despite continuing blunders in child protection services, findings suggest that the number of children becoming victim to a violent death has actually dropped during the last 30 years.

Research published in Archives of Disease in Childhood, examined national mortality statistics from the Office of National Statistics and Home Office crime figures.
 
Numbers show that between 1974 and 2008, babies dying from assault dropped from 5.6 to 0.7 per 100,000.

Children aged on to 14 years also fell from 0.6 to 0.2 per 100,000. 

Between five and 15 babies and between 15 and 45 children between the ages of one and 14 in died a violent death every year in England and Wales

This breaks down to at least one child or young person dying every week as a result of assault.

The researchers believe the reductions reflect improvements in protecting children from severe abuse.

This is despite the high-profile cases of Victoria Climbié in 2000 and Peter Connelly in 2007.

But the number of violent deaths in teenagers has not improved, with an increase in young male victims.

Between 32 and 117 teenagers aged between 15 and 19 years suffer a violent death every year.

The researchers attribute the variation in age to reflect the growing risk of violence from people outside the immediate family.