Innocents lost

The good news is that children’s deaths from abuse and neglect are on a downward trend in Sacramento County. The bad news is that 26 percent of the 176 children’s deaths in 2004 were classified as “preventable” by the county’s Child Death Review Team. The team’s 2004 annual report was presented to the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors on March 7. The report contains plenty of other information, too. For instance, children under 1 year old make up the majority of child deaths, and African-American infants in Sacrament County die in disproportionate numbers compared with other ethnic groups. The full report was published by the Child Abuse Prevention Council of Sacramento Inc., online at www.capcsac.org.

Category, Number of deaths, Rate of death per 100,000*

Natural causes
Perinatal conditions, 62, 17.2
Congenital anomalies, 31, 8.6
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, 3, —
Cancer, 10, —
Infections, 10, —
Respiratory, 1, —
Other, 6, —
Undetermined natural, 0, —
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Total natural causes 123, 33.9
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Injury-related causes
Caregiver abuse or neglect homicide, 4, —
Third-party homicide, 11, —
Arson homicide, 0, —
Car accident (occupant), 5, —
Car accident (pedestrian), 4, —
Car accident (bike), 1, —
Drowning, 7, —
Suicide, 4, —
Suffocation/choking, 0, —
Fires, 0, —
Undetermined injuries, 1, —
Other injuries, 6, —
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Total Injury-related causes, 43, 11.9
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Undetermined manner of death, 10, —
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Total 2004 child deaths, 176, 48.88
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Death rate by ethnicity
Caucasian, 65, 0.5
African-American, 45, 0.9
Hispanic, 20, 0.2
Asian, 25, 0.5
Multiracial, 21, 1.0

*Rates of death were not calculated in categories with less than 15 deaths.