Child Neglect Cases Multiply As Economic Woes Spread

"She said her family is doing everything they can to keep afloat," said Johanna W. Schuchert, executive director of Prevent Child Abuse Virginia, who took that call. "She was worried about what she's going to do next."

At Childhelp USA, a national hotline, calls reporting physical abuse have risen about 10 percent in recent weeks, said John Reid, executive director of the child abuse prevention organization, based in Arizona.

"We're seeing parents facing unemployment, foreclosure, losing their automobiles," Reid said. "And that increase in stress can lead to drug and alcohol abuse, and that's directly linked to child abuse."

In Alexandria, Suzanne Chis, director of social services, said that although her area has seen a 13 percent rise in investigations of child abuse and neglect, she has noted in reviewing cases that she has seen more instances in which domestic violence seemed to be part of the complaint. "That seemed to be related to the economy," she said.

Chis noted that, for families struggling with a problem such as violence or substance abuse, the addition of economic stress "could push that situation into something more."

In Loudoun County, the longer-term trend shows a significant increase in abuse and neglect cases, even though the jump is not reflected in statistics from July through October, said Laurie Warhol, division manager with Child Protective Services. She said child-welfare workers are seeing more families with serious financial problems and some on the verge of eviction or homelessness. "We anticipate the numbers are going to go higher as the economy gets worse," Warhol said.

Montgomery's swelling caseload is largely due to families living without utilities or skipping their children's medications -- for asthma, for example -- because they lack the money, Leshner said. This was particularly notable in October and November, which were up more than 40 percent compared with the previous year.

"Kids who have chronic health problems are not getting to the doctor and not getting the medications they need," she said.

Still, Cathy Mols, executive director of the state Social Services Administration in Maryland, cautioned against drawing too close a link between child maltreatment and the economy. She noted that such cases usually arise when multiple problems take hold at the same time: families struggling with substance abuse, domestic violence or mental illness, for example, that find themselves hit by hard times, such as a lost job or a foreclosed home. "The combination of those risk factors increases the likelihood, increases the risk to the children," she said.

Looking at the increases in Maryland counties -- up in some, not in others -- Mols concluded that, with the economy, "I think we're seeing the early impact of it, the very early impact of it."

More victims are likely to come, experts predict, as thousands of families that are struggling with home foreclosures, fueling an almost all-time high in the use of food stamps and facing homelessness keep quiet about their troubles.

Spears said they know of "middle-class families living in their cars, so afraid of losing their kids that they tell the kids not to tell anyone they're homeless," she said. "In late winter or early spring, I suspect we'll just begin to see the impact on kids."