Almost Every Native American Woman Reported Rape Or Coercion In A Survey That Was Hidden For Years

In 2010, a Seattle-based survey co-produced by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Urban Indian Health Institute found that nearly every Native woman had been raped or coerced into sex at least once in their lives. You may be wondering why a survey that's eight years out of date is only just beginning to make headlines. The answer, it turns out, is nearly as shocking as the survey's results.

Abigail Echo-Hawk began her new job as director of the Urban Indian Health Institute in 2016 in the same way many other people begin new gigs — by poking around her new office, according to a Seattle Times exclusive. That's how she found a copy of the 2010 survey, which questioned 148 women who identified as American Indian and/or Alaska Native about their experience with sexual violence, buried among other files in the very bottom drawer of a filing cabinet tucked into the corner of her office. Despite the fact that the survey revealed important findings about both the rate of sexual violence against Native women and its impact, the Urban Indian Health Institute hid it for years.

https://www.bustle.com/p/almost-every-native-american-woman-reported-rape-coercion-in-a-survey-that-was-hidden-for-years-10238977