Citation

Nakane N, Wada I. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022; 19(24): e16476.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute)

DOI

10.3390/ijerph192416476

PMID

36554361

Abstract

We sought to calculate the extra social costs resulting from child abuse in residential care facilities (RCFs) for children with disabilities (CWD) in Japan. We distributed a survey to 260 residential facilities for CWD in 2020 and obtained responses from 91 facilities. Among the children placed in these facilities, our estimates by four different criteria determined that 23-67% were affected by child abuse. We also estimated extra costs for each of the four criteria, which we estimated to average USD 647.7 million. This study is meaningful in that there are no existing official statistics or research findings on the extra costs of residential care due to child abuse in Japan.

This study aimed to calculate the additional social costs stemming from child abuse in the expenses of Japanese residential care facilities (RCFs) for children with disabilities (CWD). This project was initially undertaken by Wada and Igarashi to determine the additional costs of Japanese child maltreatment, but these researchers did not calculate the costs of residential care for CWD [1]. Complimenting their research, our study provides a further precise view of the extra social costs of Japanese child abuse. Hughes et al. examined the relationship between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), health, and other types of financial expenses in 28 European nations, similar to our study [2]. Meanwhile, Isumi et al. constructed medical assumptions about the older Japanese population with inappropriate childhood treatment and suggested that such childhood experiences can impact an individual's life and generate social expenses over the long term...

Language: en

Keywords

Japan; child maltreatment; child abuse; residential care for children with disabilities; social costs of child abuse