In what will come across as a really shocking development, a little girl has been infected with sexually transmitted diseases.
File photo used only for illustrative purpose
A child contracted gonorrhea and chlamydia at age seven or eight after she was abused by her foster father, Metro UK reports.
He ‘breached the trust placed in him by sexually abusing her’, social services said in a serious case review.
The girl, referred to as Claire although this is not her real name,
was taken into care at the age of six after a 32-year-old friend of her
brother sexually abused her as she lay in the same bed as her mum, who
had been drinking.
After several months living with her grandmother, she was placed
with a couple named as Mr and Mrs George (not their real names) in south
London, in 2012.
But the day after her first night in the placement, her school in
Croydon contacted social services to say that Claire had arrived for
lessons ‘walking splay legged’ and complained that her vagina was sore.
Teachers said this was unusual so they reported it, but social
workers thought it might have been related to the sexual abuse she
suffered previously.
She had been given a child protection plan since she was a baby,
due to concerns about drugs and alcohol abuse, domestic violence and
neglect. On one occasion, when Claire was four, she was found wandering
in the street alone as she had been locked out of the family home.
Her birth family agreed to ‘give her up to be cared for by the
state’ as they thought it would give her a better life. They said they
were devastated and angry to hear what had happened to her.
Right from the start of her placement with Mr and Mrs George, there were warning signs.
As well as the report from her teachers, Mrs George told social
workers she was finding it hard to cope. Within a week after she came to
live with them, she asked for her to be removed from the placement,
appearing distressed.
As the placement went on, things seemed to be improving, although
Mrs George had counselling for panic attacks during the year and a bit
Claire lived with them.
The truth emerged after Mrs George contacted their doctor to say
Claire had vaginal soreness, asking for cream to be prescribed. The GP
took swabs and contacted social services, concerned that she could have a
sexually transmitted infection and that she was unsafe.
‘A decision was taken to await the swab results before taking any other action,’ a case review said.
‘The (social services) manager informed the GP of this decision; the GP
correctly told the manager she was extremely concerned by this response
and went on to make numerous phone calls to health colleagues in an
attempt to elicit a different response.’
The lack of swift action ‘left Claire at risk of harm and fell well below expected practice,’ a review found.
Social workers didn’t act immediately because as Claire was
spending alternate weekends with her family, they thought she could
‘have been infected by someone outside the placement, or that the
infections had remained dormant from when Claire had been sexually
abused whilst living with her mother.’
It took five days before Claire was taken to an emergency foster placement, after the test results came back.
Social workers didn’t contact her grandma, who had been (wrongly)
told by Mrs George that Claire had been diagnosed with thrush when she
asked about her soreness.
‘The reaction of Mr and Mrs George to the information that Claire had sexually transmitted infections was one of anger,’ the review said. ‘Mr George became particularly angry and abusive; Claire witnessed this anger and was distressed.’
At a later date her foster mum Mrs George tested positive for gonorrhoea and Mr George tested positive for chlamydia.
It was felt that Mr George could have received treatment for gonorrhoea before the test was done.
Social workers blamed him for Claire’s infections.
Claire has now moved to live with specialist foster carers and
remains in this placement to date where she is said to be doing well.
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