Rate of women murdered in South Africa five times higher than global average

The rate of women murdered in South Africa has edged down but is still five times higher than the global average, with killings by intimate partners a major problem, a researcher said Friday.A study by the Medical Research Council in South Africa found a drop in overall female homicides over 10 years.

But this was not matched by a decline in killings by the victims' partners - a subject thrust into the spotlight by Oscar Pistorius shooting dead his girlfriend, who he says he believed to be a burglar.

The study's lead researcher Naeemah Abrahams told AFP on Friday that the number of women victims was still "much lower" than the number of men being killed.

"But men do not get killed by their female partners, they are killed by other men," she said.

"If you look at women they are killed in their homes by the husband or friend," she added.

The study found that from 1999 to 2009, the female homicide rate had dropped from 24.7 per 100,000 women in 1999 to 12.9 ten years later.

But the Medical Research Council admitted that the drop was not statistically significant given the actual figures: A total of 1,052 women were killed in 1999 against 930 women killed four years ago.

In comparison 16,834 men were murdered between April 2009 and end March 2010.

But "the 2009 female homicide rate in South Africa was still five times higher than the global rate of this crime", said a statement on the study.

It also found "a significant decrease" in the rate of gun homicides — from 7.5 per 100,000 women to 2.5 over the 10 years.

The study was published this week in the PLOS Medicine journal.

It was based on analysis of figures, from sources such as mortuary registers and autopsy reports, for victims aged 14 and above


Source:AFP