More and more young people are reaching out to an abuse counselling service, who expect an overall increase of 4% in calls for this year.
It is foreseen that Connect Counselling will receive more than 8,000 calls by the time 2016 ends, and a larger number of calls from existing service users this December.
The agency, open 20 hours a week from 6pm to 10pm Wednesday to Sunday, provide a professional service to survivors of abuse. The service was introduced in 2006 and is HSE funded.
In estimation, the number of overall calls for 2016 up to mid-November is 8,078 – up from 7,798 in 2015.
From these calls, 4,264 are forecast to be answered, 3,074 to be received out of hours and 739 will be lost.
Two-thirds of callers to Connect Counselling are female, and mostly youths with a reduction in older callers.
The most common situation of abuse is in the family (48%), followed by the community (34%) and 18% is institutional.
Christmas “is a particularly sensitive period in terms of public need for the service” and will provide extra opening hours during the festive season.
Connect Manager Theresa Merrigan said the high volume of calls received out of hours is a challenge for the service, however, they are striving to meet a specific demand.
Ms Merrigan stated that calls from men and women does not reflect gender balance and men are urged to reach out equally.