Poverty, Substance Abuse, and Ignorance Drive Violence Against Women
Poverty, Substance Abuse, and Ignorance Drive Violence Against Women
Dec. 15, 1999 (Cleveland) -- In the Dickens' classic A Christmas Carol, Scrooge recoils in horror from the deformed children Ignorance and Want. Just as the spirit warned of the destructive power of these two in the 19th century, modern researchers are demonstrating how women caught in the cycle of poverty and lack of education face a constant risk of violence.
Simply stated, women who live in poor neighborhoods or who live with poorly educated, substance-abusing men who are frequently unemployed are most likely to be victims of violence -- domestic and otherwise -- according to two reports in TheNew England Journal of Medicine. As disturbing as these reports may be, an accompanying editorial points out that they come just as the Supreme Court is poised to overturn the federal Violence Against Women Act.
The back-to-back studies -- one based on data collected in the emergency departments of eight large university-affiliated hospitals, and the other based on data collected from three emergency departments serving the same low-income, inner-city population -- point out that socioeconomic status does impact the prevalence of violence against women, Jeane Ann Grisso, MD, tells WebMD.
Grisso, a professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and lead author of one of the studies, says, "What is known is that it's a complicated statistical issue to grasp, but certain conditions increase the risk of being violently injured. That is a fact of intimate-related violence as well as for women who are victims of violence from persons who are not partners or former partners."
Grisso says, too, that because both studies rely upon data collected in emergency departments, the data are more likely to reflect a population of poorer women. Affluent women who are victims of violence are more likely to seek care through private physicians, she says.
A co-author of the second study, Deirdre Anglin, MD, MPH, tells WebMD that violence against women does cut across class lines, but that violence against women still seems more common among those of lower socioeconomic status. Anglin is associate professor of emergency medicine at the Los Angeles County/University of Southern California Medical Center.
Poverty, Substance Abuse, and Ignorance Drive Violence Against Women
Dec. 15, 1999 (Cleveland) -- In the Dickens' classic A Christmas Carol, Scrooge recoils in horror from the deformed children Ignorance and Want. Just as the spirit warned of the destructive power of these two in the 19th century, modern researchers are demonstrating how women caught in the cycle of poverty and lack of education face a constant risk of violence.
Simply stated, women who live in poor neighborhoods or who live with poorly educated, substance-abusing men who are frequently unemployed are most likely to be victims of violence -- domestic and otherwise -- according to two reports in TheNew England Journal of Medicine. As disturbing as these reports may be, an accompanying editorial points out that they come just as the Supreme Court is poised to overturn the federal Violence Against Women Act.
The back-to-back studies -- one based on data collected in the emergency departments of eight large university-affiliated hospitals, and the other based on data collected from three emergency departments serving the same low-income, inner-city population -- point out that socioeconomic status does impact the prevalence of violence against women, Jeane Ann Grisso, MD, tells WebMD.
Grisso, a professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and lead author of one of the studies, says, "What is known is that it's a complicated statistical issue to grasp, but certain conditions increase the risk of being violently injured. That is a fact of intimate-related violence as well as for women who are victims of violence from persons who are not partners or former partners."
Grisso says, too, that because both studies rely upon data collected in emergency departments, the data are more likely to reflect a population of poorer women. Affluent women who are victims of violence are more likely to seek care through private physicians, she says.
A co-author of the second study, Deirdre Anglin, MD, MPH, tells WebMD that violence against women does cut across class lines, but that violence against women still seems more common among those of lower socioeconomic status. Anglin is associate professor of emergency medicine at the Los Angeles County/University of Southern California Medical Center.
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