First, save the children

THE sexual abuse of children wrecks lives. Survivors can suffer severe harm to their mental and physical health. That is one reason why no crime provokes greater revulsion. Another is that a shamed society has only recently begun to acknowledge how common abuse really is. And yet, precisely because abuse has been covered up for so long, no crime is more widely misunderstood. The result is that the need to punish abusers is sometimes being pursued at the expense of prevention. That means children are not being protected as they should be.