"Strengthening the medico-legal response to sexual violence" is designed to be used by people working in health, social services, forensic medicine and lab services, police, the legal system (including judges and lawyers), and those coordinating these sectors.
The toolkit provides practical guidance to people working in and across all of these sectors, so that they can better support the collection of medical and legal evidence.
Globally, 1 in 3 women experience physical and/or sexual violence by an intimate partner or sexual violence by someone other than a partner in their lifetime.
Women who experience partner violence are twice as likely to suffer from depression and 1.5 times more likely to have a sexually transmitted infection including HIV, compared to those who have never been exposed to such violence.
They are also more likely to have unwanted pregnancies, unsafe abortions and when the violence occurs during pregnancy to suffer miscarriages, stillbirths, premature births and to have low birth weight babies.
In helping strengthen the role of the health sector in the prevention and response of violence against women and girls, WHO supports countries ensuring that they can respond and provide appropriate health care services – including mental health support – to women who have experienced violence, and to connect women with other services as needed.
This includes building the capacity of health care workers at all levels of the system to know how to identify and respond appropriately to those suffering from violence and its consequences, including in humanitarian settings.
Statement on the fifth meeting of the International Health Regulations (2005) Emergency Committee regarding the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic