`Millions of Americans are victims of attacks by partners’

December 15th, 2011 - 12:05 pm ICT by IANS  

Atlanta, Dec 15 (IANS/EFE) An average of 24 people per minute become the victims of rape, physical violence or harassment by their partner or spouse in the US, according to a survey released Wednesday.

The survey by the US Centers for Disease Control found that more than 12 million women and men have been the victims of some attack of this type.

“This report highlights the heavy toll that sexual violence, stalking and intimate partner violence places on adults in this country,” Linda Degutis, the head of CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, said.

She said that the report’s findings emphasize the need for authorities to continue their efforts to combat domestic and sexual violence.

Responses to the CDC’s National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey indicate that 1 million women were victims of rape or attempted rape in the previous 12 months.

The poll found that almost one in every five women and one in every 71 men in the US have been raped at some time in their lives.

More than half the women - 51.1 percent - who have been the victims of an attack said they were raped by their intimate partner and 40.8 percent said that the rape was perpetrated by an acquaintance.

In the case of men, more than half reported that they were raped by a person they knew and 15.1 percent said they were raped by a person they did not know.

The report found that the majority of female rape victims were attacked for the first time before they were 25, while 42.2 percent were raped before they turned 18.

–IANS/EFE
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