I don’t know if you have looked at our Amber Alert GPS home page lately, but we recently put up a little scrolling ticker that displays missing children statistics*. I think you will find these quite interesting. Here are the stats for your perusal now:
1. In the US, approximately 800,000 children (under age 18) go missing.
2. 203,900 children are victims of family abductions each year.
3. 115 children are kidnapped each year in the US (the kind of kidnapping we worry about the most).
What I find most interesting about these statistics is that most folks are worried about some stranger driving up and luring our children into their car (#3 above). But, what is really frightening is that the kidnapping number (115) is only 1/100 of one percent of the really big number…missing children (800,000), and only a tiny fraction of kids who are the victims of family abductions.
So, the real fear should be our kids just going missing…and not necessarily kidnapped. Just think upon a time when one of your kids went missing for an extended period of time. Wasn’t it nerve wracking? That is what most families go through at least once. Some special needs families go through this every week!
Incredible numbers, aren’t they?
Julia Howard
“Tracking your child has never been easier”
www.amberalertgps.com
*Taken from the “National Center for Missing and Exploited Children”; http://www.missingkids.com/
