Suggest ways police, court’s and correctional Services to stop IPV and crime against women in South Africa
Answers
Many workshop speakers and participants throughout the 2-day program commented on the multidirectional and multisectoral nature of IPV in the region. This in coordination with the complexities of IPV and its effects on the region have made developing effective and streamlined responses across governments, NGOs, and various sectors of society challenging. However, there are a multitude of positive efforts being made across a wide variety of sectors throughout the region. This chapter will highlight some of those efforts, including a discussion on screening efforts as well as barriers to accessing services and responses from the criminal justice, social work, and health sectors.
SCREENING FOR IPV IN EAST AFRICA
Speaker Chi-Chi Undie, an Associate at the Population Council, Kenya, explained that the routine screening for IPV in a given population remains a point of contention within the prevention community. Conflicting evidence regarding the efficacy of these efforts has left many in the region unsure of what to do in terms of screening efforts, including researchers and health workers wondering what the actual benefits of screening are and how they can be measured or evaluated.
In terms of measuring or evaluating the benefits of screening, Undie asked what evidence should carry more weight: that from a randomized controlled trial (RCT) or sources of evidence that are more qualitative in nature, reflecting a patient-centered approach that is difficult to capture within an RCT. Undie also cited the barriers to screening and care that are presumed to exist throughout the region despite a lack of evidence that they truly mitigate screening efforts. She went on to explain that these issues and questions need to be explored in a more regional context in order to ascertain whether or not screening for IPV is an effective and beneficial use of limited time and resources throughout the region.
Undie explained that the driving force behind the notion that basic screening and intervention efforts for IPV are ineffective, is a 2013 study from Rachel Jewkes, titled “The End of Routine Screening” (Jewkes, 2013). Undie explained that this study reviewed three separate papers analyzing the efficacy of basic screening efforts. Jewkes' conclusion, Undie stated, was that the time for performing the routine screening and identification of abused women and the provision of a standard intervention has ended. Jewkes contends that these efforts are ineffective and do not make the best use of available resources. Undie explained that these conclusions have been shared broadly throughout the IPV-prevention field despite the fact that the studies reviewed by Jewkes are from developed nations, meaning that perhaps those findings do not translate to the East African context.