Therapy can help paedophile refrain from desire - Psychologist

Special therapy sessions can help paedophiles to refrain and control from acting on their desires, says a psychologist.

Social Psychologist Dr Kamal Kenny said among therapy recommended is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) which aims to reduce the likelihood of a sexual offence against children.

He said the CBT programme involves the training of self-control and changing of a person's way of thinking and behaviour, especially in their view of sex with children.

"At the moment there is no functional treatment to cure pedophilia, instead, the focus is on the therapies of helping pedophiles refrain from such actions and reduce the risk of repeated offences," he told Bernama when contacted here today.

Recently, British pedophile Richard Huckle was given 22 life sentences by a court in London for sexually violating 23 children and babies in Malaysia, as well as children in Cambodia, for almost a decade.

Reuters reported that Huckle, 30, would be in jail for at least 23 years for the crimes he had committed on children aged between six months and 12 years, who were from poor families in Kuala Lumpur.

Huckle pleaded guilty to 71 offences and police found more than 20,000 pornographic images of children in his computer and camera when he was arrested at the Gatwick Airport in London in 2014.

British media reported that Huckle, a freelance photographer, had abused up to 200 children aged between six months and 12 years from 2006 to 2014.

Dr Kamal who is also the consultant for the Federation of Reproductive Health Associations, Malaysia (FRHAM) said preventative strategies and measures are more important than looking at remedial mechanism only when an issue of sexual abuse arises.

He said a platform should be created where issues like these can be voiced out and experts in the area should be engaged to help look at better policies and programmes.

"Agencies should come together in looking at an integrated framework that will not only prevent sexual abuse, but other social ills in totality," he said.

Meanwhile, FRHAM executive director Mary Pang said the issue of child abuse can be minimized with proper sex education inculcated especially at the school level for children to understand the issue better and not become a potential victim in the future.

"There is a wrong conception of the subject and that is why we need to break away from the social stigma, we are educating and not promoting sex.

"We have to let them (children) know what the correct behaviour is, which part of the body is personal and what is acceptable and what is not," she added.