Sexual abuse among athletes: 215 cases reported in Netherlands last year

Last year Dutch sports federation NOC*NSF received 215 reports of sexual abuse from athletes. "Every case of sexual abuse is one too many", Minister Edith Schippers of Sports said about the figure, RTL Nieuws reports.

Athletes can report any form of unacceptable behavior, such as abuse of power, doping, bribery and sexual abuse, at the NOC*NSF contact point. Last year there were 269 reports, 80 percent of which involved sexual abuse.

"We suspect that the number of cases of sexual abuse is much higher, because not everyone reports it", a spokesperson for NOC*NSF said to RTL.

On Friday morning the federation announced that it wants to launch a major investigation, spanning the past 30 years, into sexual abuse among athletes. This follows English football players coming forward to say that trainer Barry Bennel of the club Crewe Alexandra sexually abused them for years. On Wednesday former cyclist Petra de Bruin also revealed that she was sexually abused during her career.