IN OUR OWN BACKYARD ...

350,000 people have reached out to rape crisis centers across Pennsylvania within the last decade. (Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape)

During fiscal year 2000-2001, sexual assault centers in Pennsylvania served 36,046 individuals which included:
13,071 adult victims,
9,881 child victims, and
13,094 significant others (spouses/partners, parents, and family members).
Sexual assault counselors spent 228,402 hours working with victims and their significant others. Prevention educators reached 484,959 students by providing close to 21,500 school programs throughout Pennsylvania and presented over 3,200 community programs reaching more than 68,200 individuals within their respective communities. (Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape)

In Luzerne County, police respond to 24 family violence calls per day -- more than 8,500 domestic violence incidents each year. (Domestic Violence Service Center, Wilkes-Barre.)

AROUND THE WORLD ...

• Over one million women and children are trafficked each year worldwide for forced labor, domestic servitude, or sexual exploitation. (Congressional Research Service, February 2001)
  
• At least 60 million girls who would otherwise be expected to be alive are "missing" from various populations, mostly Asia, as a result of sex-selective abortions, infanticide or neglect. (United Nations Study on the Status of Women, 2000)
  
• At least one in three women and girls has been beated or sexually abused in her lifetime (UN Report on the Commissiom on the Status of Women, February 2000).
  
• A woman is raped every 26 seconds in South Africa (USINA, 1998).
  

IN THE U.S.A. ...

• Somewhere in (North) America, a woman is raped every 90 seconds. (US Department of Justice, 2000)
  
• Somewhere in America a woman is battered, usually by her intimate partner, every 15 seconds. (UN Study on the Status of Women, 2000).
  
• According to the Justice Department, 1 in 2 rape victims is under 18; 1 in 6 is under 12. (Child rape victims, 1992)
  
• Approximately 50% of the homeless women and children in the United States are on the streets because of violence in their homes. ("A Report on the 1998 National Survey of Shelters for the Homeless," U.S.)
  
• Pregnant or recently pregnant women are more likely to be the victims of homicide than to die of any other cause (Journal of the American Medical Association, March 2001)
  
• 1 in 3 murdered females are killed by a partner, versus 3.6% of males. (US Department of Justice, May 2000).