April is Child Abuse Awareness Month and we talk to the CEO of Covenant Children’s Hospital about the significance of the Blue Ribbon and where it started.
Sporting blue during child abuse awareness month has been a long tradition. Some super heroes were out today hoping to help raise awareness. Dr. Thompson says that “the tradition was actually started by a grandmother a number of years ago who had a grandchild that was a victim of child abuse and she had the blue ribbon because it signified the blue bruises. She tied a blue ribbon on the antenna of her car because she wanted people to ask her about it and so it was the initial attempt at raising awareness for the signs of child abuse in our society.”
Today Dr. Thompson and her staff have continued the blue ribbon tradition by tying a blue ribbon for each child who had a confirmed case in the last year in Lubbock County.
Dr. Thompson says, “they want to remember and heighten awareness for child abuse we want to have a lot of recognition and encouragement in the community to remember this is a big problem for us.”
Such a problem that Lubbock County ranks third in the state for the number of child abuse cases. Today at Covenant Children’s more than 11-hundred ribbons were tied and four deaths were remembered. As a Dr., Thompson says, “that seeing the abuse is painful.”
But Thompson says there are programs in place to help children who have been through the abuse. She says, “there are assistance programs and that they are proud to work with Texas Tech. They have a new grant that raises awareness of abuse and also helps victims of child abuse help after it happens.”
