But you’re seeing “plenty” of kids being hurt by strangers in their home. How many times a month is plenty? Also, can you share some details. Are the strangers intruders? AirBNB renters? Something else?
I’m not trying to cast aspersions on AirBNB — I was making general commentary on the fact that kids are in fact hurt injured by strangers as well as friends and family. I don’t want to derail the conversation too much, but I’ll try to give an answer to the question.
I work in a pediatric emergency department in a children’s hospital in an urban environment, and victims of violence of varying types are something that comes through our door semi-regularly — sometimes we (or someone else) figure it out, and sometimes the child is old enough to tell us.
Most doctors, even most pediatricians, don’t routinely see patients who were abused or assaulted, but because of where I work and the type of work I do, I see an abnormal concentration of them.
Children are far more likely to be abused by someone known to the family than a complete stranger, however that’s also presupposing the more common exposures, which is “known” entities, such as family members, parents significant others, etc.
I also see children and teenagers who are assaulted without clear provocation on a semi-regular basis (sometimes with provocation too I’m sure).
I can’t say I’ve ever come cared for a child who was assaulted by an AirBNB renter. I’ve seen plenty who were assaulted by known entities who were allowed to be in the home as well as strangers who came to a house during a party or other gathering.
It’s hard for me to give a # because I don’t keep track, and I don’t work every shift in our own ER. I’ll tell you that there’s enough of it happening that just about every medium or large children’s hospital in the country has pediatric specialists dedicated to evaluating and treating children who are victims of abuse. There is an accredited 3-year fellowship for it with its own board exam.
We have two pediatricians who are a subgroup of my division who sub specialize in it. One of them actually gave us a CME talk today. And there aren’t enough of these specialists to go around — not many are in training at any given time.
Our house isn’t set up well for an AirBNB — no separate entrance to the basement that has the extra bed/bathroom and no way to separate it from the rest of the house. No way I would let random people over the internet book a chance to stay in our house with our 3 young children.
Obviously (or perhaps not so obviously) I never doubted that there are a lot of abused kids. I just thought that seeing a lot abused by "strangers in the home" was weird, because "strangers in the home" is not a scenario that occurs very often (repairmen, delivery people, AirBNB renters, intruders etc. -- I can't think of a whole lot more because it's just not that common) and when it does normally everyone is alert (which is not the case with friends, family, acquaintances, etc.) and strangers are regarded with suspicion, so the opportunities are likely to be fewer.
I'm not sure I'd describe people invited over for a party as strangers. But I guess it's possible that people have different kinds of parties than I might. Or maybe if someone crashes the party and then goes on to assault a child, I guess it would count. If you've seen a lot of those, I'll take your word for it, but it is pretty surprising.
Even after all you've typed, I'm still not convinced that kids abused/assaulted by "strangers in the home" is a thing that happens on a frequent basis. Unless you have a very unorthodox definition of "stranger" and "frequent".
I would never rent a room in my house to AirBNB renters unless I was in some dire financial situation, but my reason is far more related to just general discomfort/weirdness of having a stranger around than safety. But concern for safety is definitely a part of it.
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