Survey Reveals Over 60 Percent of Nigerian Children are Abused Before 18

A population-based study from the Nigerian Violence Against Children (VAC) survey, have shown that more than six out of every 10 Nigerian children under the age of 18 experience some form of physical, emotional and sexual violence.The population-based study reportedly carried out by the National Population Commission in collaboration with the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, was released on Thursday in Abuja and it shows that physical violence in childhood is the most common type of abuse reported.
The study however, provides the first national representative data on the prevalence of violence among female and male children in Nigeria and is the first of its kind in the West African sub-region.