65

Statistical monitoring of violence against children is essential in order to improve knowledge of a phenomenon that has serious consequences for the health of the public concerned and to steer national and local policies for the prevention and care of minors who are the victims. Rigorous observation requires the complexities relating to child abuse in particular be addressed and several methodological problems be resolved. These issues include the categorisation of forms of violence, determination of the relevant accounting unit, the perimeter of the public studied, and the timeframe of the count. The recent development of various measurement systems, in public statistics, epidemiology and in the child protection observation system, affords reliable data to shed light on child abuse and neglect from a variety of perspectives.