Did You Know…

Facts about War

There are 42 million people in the world uprooted by war. That’s twice the number of people that live on the continent of Australia. 105 countries in the world have populations smaller than this.

Global spending on defense totals more than $700 billion. Global spending on education is less than $100 billion.

There are at least 250,000 child soldiers fighting in armed conflict.

Torture occurs in more than 100 countries and is carried out as part of government policy in at least 40.

The United States is the world’s biggest arms exporter supplying around 40 per cent of the developing world’s arms. It’s military budget is as large as the next ten top-spending countries combined.

90 percent of modern war casualties are civilians — primarily women and children.

War has killed 2 million children in the last twenty years.

In the last 5600 years there have been only 292 years of peace.

Since 1495, no 25-year period has been without war.

Income tax was invented by the British to finance the 100 Years War with France.

There are 92 known cases of nuclear bombs lost at sea.

Cost of the War in Iraq

Isn’t it strange that the $700,000,000,000.00 price tag of the original Wall Street Bailout is nearly identical to the cost of invading and occupying Iraq?

War expenditures in Iraq alone would shelter, feed and provide medicine for all 42,000,000 displaced victims of war for 45 years.

What is the Cost of Peace

Practically speaking, if it takes $70,720.00 in war expenses to create one war refugee in Iraq and only $5.00 a day in humanitarian aid to save their life, what is the real cost of peace?

Domestic Violence

(Provided by ThePeaceAlliance.org)

A recent World Health Organization report estimated the cost of interpersonal violence in the U.S. (excluding war related costs) at $300 billion a year. [The Economic Dimensions of Interpersonal Violence, World Health Organization, 2004]

Direct expenditures for corrections by local, state and federal governments between 1982 and 2004 increased 585 percent to $62 billion per year. [Direct Expenditures by Criminal Justice Function, 1982-2004, Bureau of Justice Statistics]

In 2001, almost 21,000 homicides and 31,000 suicides occurred; and almost 1.8 million people were assaulted, while about 323,000 harmed themselves and were treated in hospital emergency departments. (Surveillance for Fatal and Nonfatal Injuries - 2001, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention National Vital Statistics System)

The health-related costs of rape, physical assault, stalking and homicide committed by intimate partners exceed $5.8 billion each year. Of that amount, nearly $4.1 billion are for direct medical and mental health care services, and nearly $1.8 billion are for the indirect costs of lost productivity or wages. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Costs of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women in the United States, April 2003.)

A 1992 study in the United States put the annual cost of treating gunshot wounds at $126 billion. Cutting and stab wounds cost an additional $51 billion. (Miller TR, Cohen MA.,. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 1997, 29:329:341.)

Domestic Violence is the single greatest cause of injury to women. [Journal of Amer. Med. Assoc.]

In 2005, there were 191,670 victims of rape, attempted rape or sexual assaults according to the 2005 National Crime Victimization Survey

22% of women in the U.S. have reported being physically assaulted by an intimate partner. [Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health, 1999 (Population Reports, Series L, No. 11)]

In the year 2001, more than half a million American women (588,490 women) were victims of nonfatal violence committed by an intimate partner. (Bureau of Justice Statistics Crime Data Brief, Intimate Partner Violence, 1993-2001, February 2003)

In 2001, 41,740 women were victims of rape/sexual assault committed by an intimate partner. (Bureau of Justice Statistics Crime Data Brief, Intimate Partner Violence, 1993-2001, February 2003.)

As many as 324,000 women each year experience intimate partner violence during their pregnancy. (Gazmararian JA, Petersen R, Spitz AM, Goodwin MM, Saltzman LE, Marks JS. “Violence and reproductive health; current knowledge and future research directions.” Maternal and Child Health Journal 2000;4(2):79-84.)

The World Health Organization declared that violence is a leading worldwide public health problem. [World Report on Violence and Health, World Health Organization 2002]

37% of women treated in emergency rooms for violent injuries were hurt by a current or former partner. ["Violence Related Injuries Treated in Hospitals." US Dept. of Justice, August 1997]

44 - Percentage of women murdered by an intimate partner who visited an emergency room in the two years prior to their deaths. ["Predicting Future Among Women in Abusive Relationships." The Journal of Trauma Injury, Infection and Critical Care, 2004.]

A 1992 study estimates that direct and indirect costs of gunshot wounds $126 Billion. Cutting and stab wounds cost an additional $51 billion. [Accident, Analysis and Prevention, 1997, 29:329:341.]

Handguns are used in 80 percent of homicides, nearly 70 percent of suicides and nearly all accidental shootings. [Prevention First]

$48,000,000 - Amount by which federal family violence prevention services program were under funded in 2005. [Campaign for funding to end violence againt women. FY Budget Briefing Book. www.ncadv.org/files/compiledbriefingbookandchartsfy06.pdf]

In Los Angeles County between 1981 and 1992, 15,000 people died of AIDS, but 22,000 died as a result of homicide. [Los Angeles Department of Health Services]

U.S. Youth Violence

In 2004, 5,292 young people ages 10 to 24 were murdered–an average of 15 each day. [Youth Violence Facts at a Glance, Summer 2007, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)]

In the U.S., youth homicide rates are more than 10 times that of other leading industrialized nations, on par with the rates in developing countries and those experiencing rapid social and economic changes. The youth homicide rate in the U.S. stood at 11.0 per 100,000 compared to France (0.6 per 100 000), Germany (0.8 per 100 000), the United Kingdom (0.9 per 100 000) and Japan (0.4 per 100 000). [World Report on Violence and Health, World Health Organization 2002]

Persons under the age of 25 accounted for nearly 50 percent of those arrested for murder and 62 percent of those arrested for robbery in 2005. [Youth Violence Facts at a Glance, Summer 2007, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)]

Homicide was the second leading cause of death for people ages 10 to 24 in 2001. Suicide was the third leading cause of death for people ages 10 to 24 in 2002. (Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System - 2002, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

Seventeen percent of high school girls have been abused physically; twelve percent of high school girls have been abused sexually. (The Formative Years: Pathways to Substance Abuse Among Girls and Young Women Ages 8-22, The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, 2003)

About 1 in 3 high school students say they have been in a physical fight in the past year, and about 1 in 8 of those students required medical attention for their injuries. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Youth risk behavior surveillance - United States, 2001. In: CDC Surveillance Summaries, June 28, 2002. MMWR, 51(SS-4), p. 5.)

In the United States, some 31,000 gangs were operating in 1996 in about 4800 cities and towns. [World Report on Violence and Health, World Health Organization 2002]

Over 70 percent of School Resource Officers surveyed felt that aggressive behavior in elementary school children has increased in their districts in the past five years. (2003 NASRO School Resource Officer Survey, National Association of School Resource Officers)

Of children in sixth through tenth grade, more than 3.2 million-nearly one in six-are victims of bullying each year, while 3.7 million bully other children. (Bullying Prevention is Crime Prevention,- Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, 2003)

Nearly 60 percent of boys who researchers classified as bullies in grades six through nine were convicted of at least one crime by the age of 24. Even more dramatic, 40 percent of them had three or more convictions by age 24. (Bullying Prevention is Crime Prevention,- Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, 2003)

A significant number of School Resource Officers (SROs) reported budget cuts for school safety funding in their local school districts, inadequacies in federal school safety funding, and the need for an “Education Homeland Security Act to fund school terrorism training, improve security and crisis planning, and support SRO programs. (2003 NASRO School Resource Officer Survey, National Association of School Resource Officers)

A study on the cost-effectiveness of early intervention to prevent serious crime in California, showed that training for parents whose children exhibited aggressive behavior was estimated to have prevented 157 serious crimes (such as homicide, rape, arson and robbery) for every $1 million spent. In fact, training in parenting skills was estimated to be about three times as cost-effective as the so-called ‘‘three-strikes’’ law in California. [Greenwood PW et al. Diverting children from a life of crime: measuring costs and benefits. Rand, 1996.]

Nearly 16 children a day died in 1997 as a result of a firearms homicide, suicide or unintentional shooting. [Children’s Defense Fund, 1998]

Between 1986 and 1992, the total number of children killed by firearms rose by 144 percent. [National Campaign to Reduce Youth Violence]

From 1985 to 1993, murders committed by people over age 25 dropped 20 percent; but they increased 65 percent among 18- to 24-year-olds and increased 165 percent among 14- to 17-year-olds. [Northeastern University’s College of Criminal Justice]

From 1985 to 1992, the homicide rate for 16-year-olds increased 138%, while the rate among 18-year-olds doubled, and the rate for 24-year-olds and above either remained the same or declined. [National Institute of Justice Research Preview, 1995]

Children in adult jails commit suicide eight times as often as their counterparts in juvenile facilities. In addition, children in adult facilities are five times more likely to be sexually assaulted, and twice as likely to be beaten by jail staff. [Children’s Defense Fund, 1998]

Annual rates of firearm homicides for youths age 15-19 increased 155% between 1989 and 1994. [National Summary of Injury Mortality Data, 1987-1994; National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, 1996]

In the United States, some 31,000 gangs were operating in 1996 in about 4800 cities and towns. [World Report on Violence and Health, World Health Organization 2002]

Large cities claim that 72% of their school violence is attributable in part to gang activity. [National League of Cities 1994 survey of 700 U.S. cities]

In Los Angeles County between 1981 and 1992, a child between five and nine was slain, on average, every eight and a half days. [Los Angeles Department of Health Services]

In Los Angeles County, the use of semiautomatic handguns in gang-related killings has more than quadrupled, to more than 40 percent. [Los Angeles Department of Health Services]

World Violence

Worldwide, an estimated 1.6 million people lost their lives to violence in 2000. About half were suicides, one-third were homicides, and one-fifth were casualties of armed conflict. (World Report on Violence and Health, World Health Organization, 2002)

In 2006, worldwide terrorist incidents increased 25 percent to 14,000, and deaths caused increased 40 percent to 20,000 persons. [Report on Terrorist Incidents, 2006 (issued April 2007), National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC)]

In 1992, handguns killed 33 people in Great Britain, 36 in Sweden, 97 in Switzerland, 60 in Japan, 13 in Australia, 128 in Canada, and 13,200 in the United States. [Handgun Control Inc., cited in The Washington Post, 1998]