By Staff
Melissa Cason
Four children die every day as a result of child abuse and three out of four of these children are victims under the age of four.
Nationally, a report of child abuse is made every 10 seconds. Nearly 37 percent of all women in prison and 15 percent of all men in prison in the U.S. were abused as children.
These statistics may sound shocking.
Unfortunately, they are true in our society today. April is Child Abuse Awareness Month.
The Franklin County Department of Human Resources will host a child abuse prevention service and balloon release on Friday, April 3 at 10 a.m. The ceremony will take place at DHR, located on County Road 48.
Blue ribbons will be distributed to be worn during April to promote child abuse awareness.
In addition to this ceremony, DHR and other concerned residents will participate in the annual Walk-a-Mile for a Child to bring awareness of child abuse.
"We want to get everyone involved to bring even more awareness of child abuse," Co-Chair of the Franklin County Domestic Violence Response Coalition David Hester said.
This year's service will be held at the Franklin County Courthouse at noon on April 16.
"We have moved the walk to noon so that we can have as many people attend the service as possible," Hester said.
The walk will take place in downtown Russellville, and entire event is expected to take about an hour.
Hester said both of the events scheduled with DHR and the walk will hopefully bring more awareness that child abuse takes place in our county.
"We want to send the message that child abuse is wrong and it won't be tolerated in our county," Hester said.
Hester also encourages everyone to wear the blue ribbons all month long to bring awareness to child abuse.
The blue ribbon has been widely recognized as a national symbol of child abuse awareness. This movement began in 1989 when a concerned grandmother took a stand against child abuse after experiencing the death of her grandson.
She tied a symbolic blue ribbon to her van as a signal to the community of her personal commitment to involve everyone in the battle to stop child abuse.