Child abuse consists of any act or failure to act that endangers a child's physical or emotional health and development. A person caring for a child is abusive if he or she fails to nurture the child, physically injures the child, or relates sexually to the child. There are four major types of child abuse: physical, sexual, emotional, and neglect. Physical abuse is any non-accidental physical injury to a child. Even if the parent or caretaker who inflicts the injury might not have intended to hurt the child, the injury is not considered an accident if the caretaker's actions were intentional. This injury may be the result of any assault on a child's body, such as the following: beating, punching, choking, hair-pulling, burning with cigarettes, scalding water, or severe physical punishment that is inappropriate to child's age. Hundreds of thousands of children are physically abused each year by someone close to them, and thousands of children die from the injuries. For those who survive, the emotional scars are deeper than the physical scars.
             Sexual abuse of a child is any sexual act between an adult and a child. A few include: fondling, touching, or kissing a child's or making the child perform these actions, penetration, intercourse, incest, rape, oral sex, sodomy, or child prostitution. Emotional abuse is any attitude, behavior, or failure to act on the part of the caregiver that interferes with a child's mental health or social development. Verbal, mental, and psychological maltreatment or abuse are three other names for emotional abuse. Some forms of the abuse are as follows: rejection, not saying "I love you," yelling, screaming, threatening, frightening, belittling, shaming, humiliating, terrorizing, or parental child abduction.
             Neglect is a failure to provide for the child's basic needs. There are three types a neglect: physical, educational, and emotional. Physical neglect is not providing for a child's physical needs, in...