The Editor, Sir:

Even though I have been watching the news and have seen the spate of senseless attacks on young girls, it never hit me so hard as when my own mother called me to remind me that she loves me and that she wants me to be careful on the streets. It pierced my heart and opened my eyes.

Have you ever really stopped to think about how our mothers must be fretting and worrying and praying with all their might that this angel of death will not visit their homes? How they must be agitated when their children leave home for school in the mornings? How they must be relieved when their children return home from school in the evenings? How grateful they must be that the only harm their children saw that day were cuts and scrapes and playground bruises?

Creative genius

Betty-Ann Blaine started an organisation called 'Hear The Children's Cry', and that is very important. But I think, in this time, we need another group; for mothers. Nothing compares to a mother's love for her child, and if mothers get together and exercise their creative genius, unleash the full extent of their maternal instincts, they will probably come up with more effective precautionary measures and solutions for this crisis than anybody else. Jamaica needs to hear the mothers' cries.

I am, etc.,

RUTH HOWARD

ruthibelle@gmail.com