Prank calls plague child abuse hotline

PRANK calls plague 24/7 child abuse hotline every Sunday, an official said.

Phoebe Keith Cinco, call taker of the Kean Gabriel Hotline, claimed that they receive around 15 prank calls every Sunday as the hotline number is flashed during airing time of Byaheng DO30.

On weekdays, they still receive an average of 3-5 prank calls per day.

“Usahay ipa-ring tapos patyon, usahay pud bata ang magtubag, usahay pud TV or Radio (Some drop the call, there are also instances that children are the ones calling, or there's only TV, radio noise in the background)," she said.

She said oftentimes they receive phone calls from drunk people around midnight and advised not to make fun of the hotline because they block the numbers of prank callers.

“Dili unta magyaga-yaga because if they reach ten times doing prank calls, gina-block namo ang number so sayang ang mga ma-block na number, basin tinuod na sa sunod ang ilang issue dili na sila ka-contact sa hotline (They should not make prank calls because if the same number calls ten times for no reason, it will be blocked. What if they will need to report a legitimate issue? Then they will no longer have access to the hotline),” she said.

Sinco also reported that since they opened the hotline on October 2016 until January 2017, they already recorded 137 cases of child abuse.

For January 2017 alone there were recorded 34 reported cases. Physical abuse got the highest share of 41 percent, next is sexual abuse with 17 percent, and child custody case with 10 percent.

Still based on their January data, nine physical abuse cases for male and three for female children were also recorded.

Five of these children are 13 to 15 years old, four of them are 6 to 12 years old, two are 0 to 5 years old, and one in late teens.

The hotline Kean Gabriel was named after Kean Gabriel Agustin, a three-year-old toddler who died from being beaten up and placed in a sack in the hands of his stepfather as his mother watched.

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