The state’s Department of Human Services has released a report on child abuse that shows the state has a long way to go toward keeping Pennsylvania youths safe.

A total of 405 fatalities and near fatalities — of which 166 involved deaths and 239 nearly resulted in the loss of life — that occurred between 2015 and 2016 were subject to review by the department. Of those incidents, 220 — 82 fatalities and 138 near fatalities — were substantiated as child abuse.

This report follows a recent review by the staff of state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale that found that more than 240,000 students in Pennsylvania attend school districts that lack updated policies on how to report child abuse. Local parents will be glad to know that Butler was not among those districts.

A 2017 report from the department found that substantiated reports of child abuse had increased from 1.6 per thousand children in 2016 to 1.8 per thousand the following year.

As we wrote in a recent editorial on the auditor general’s findings, one child being abused in Pennsylvania is entirely too many.

As part of its report, the Department of Human Services convened an analysis team that includes staff members from various state agencies. The team’s recommendations on how to improve the fatality and near-fatality review process include the establishment of regional review teams to provide greater support for state initiatives, expanding education on fatality and near-fatality reviews to include everything from health care providers to law enforcement, researching the effectiveness of crisis hotlines and other support systems, exploring an alert system between health care providers and managed care organizations to identify potential abuse cases, making resources that educate on the signs of abuse more available and amending the Child Protective Services Law to provide a more streamlined review process.

Teresa Miller, the state’s Human Services secretary, said that the report’s recommendations will enable the state to create “stronger, safer systems” to protect children from abuse.

We certainly hope so.

According to a 2015 study by the Crimes Against Children Research Center, the most commonly cited suggestions for improving the battle against child abuse were clarifying and improving the screening process and making it easier to file a report.

The state should continue to investigate how to make it easier to report child abuse and school districts should ensure that their policies are up to date. While it’s good that the number of child abuse cases in Pennsylvania has not risen as substantially as national statistics and those of other states, the state should aggressively seek ways to protect youths by eradicating this scourge.