Formerly entitled consultant paediatrician (community child health), these are specialists dealing with children with chronic problems not involving acute or hospital care. For example, they have a primary role in dealing with disabled children, children with special educational needs and abused children.... community paediatrician
A perverse sexual attraction to children of either sex. Paedophiles are nearly always male and may have heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual orientation.
In England and Wales, the age of consent for heterosexual and homosexual sex is 16 years; in Northern Ireland, 17 years; and in Scotland the age of consent for heterosexual sex is 12 for a girl and 14 for a boy. However, girls are protected by Section 5 of the Criminal Law (Consolidation) Act 1995 which makes it an o?ence to have sexual intercourse with a girl aged under
16. For girls under 13, the maximum sentence is life-imprisonment, and between 13 and 16, two years’ imprisonment. Homosexual consent in Scotland is 16.
Paedophiles suffer from personality problems rather than overt psychoses (see PSYCHOSIS) and the origins of their behaviour may lie in their own early sexual experiences. Their behaviour often has features of an addiction.
It is of note that most underaged sex is between family members such as stepfather and daughter rather than with a stranger or predatory paedophile.
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