He public spending to face the violence against women in Dominican Republic is trapped in a pattern in which the State invests four times more in responding to emergencies than in prevention.
An analysis of the financial execution of the Women’s Ministrybetween January and September of 20232024 and 2025, reveals that, for every peso invested in the care of victims25 cents were allocated to the prevention.
In those periods, the institution executed RD$ 982.9 million, of which RD$ 785.9 million was concentrated in security services. victim carewhile RD$ 197.1 million were allocated to preventive programs such as training and awareness in gender equality and equity, technical assistance to incorporate the gender perspective, for the mainstreaming of the gender approach, inter-institutional agreements and agreements to increase the level of autonomy of women, among others.
The triennium review of each year confirms that the pattern has been maintained in terms of the line of attention to victims. In 2023 It cost RD$ 244.3 million, a figure that rose to RD$ 273.2 million in 2024 and decreased slightly to RD$ 268.2 million in 2025.
In contrast, the investment in prevention was around 25%, reaching RD$ 63.1 million in 2023showing an increase of RD$ 73.5 million in 2024 and a decrease to RD$ 60.4 million in 2025, showing that the demands on health services emergency were the greatest weight of the system above the early intervention.
The magnitude of the problem
According to the economist Nelson Suarezthis disparity between repair vs. prevent evidence that “The public policies and the budgetary resources allocated to confront this epidemic do not correspond to the colossal dimensions of the problem“, in a context where femicidesthe breakdown of homes and hundreds of orphaned children show the growing social cost of violence.
He argued that most of the budget remains focused on addressing the emergencywhile the prevention continues relegated and without real weight within the Budget General of the State. In this, he indicated that the Comprehensive Reduction Program of the Gender Violence and Intrafamily represented just 0.064% of national spending in 2025 and the 0.076% projected for 2026.
“It’s not the first thing”
For her part, the president of the Board of Help for Cases of Abused Women, Soraya Laraunderstands that attention to victims continues to be essential, due to the risk level and vulnerability in which many women find themselves.
However, he insisted that this effort alone will never be enough as long as the country does not invest with the same force in dismantling the beliefs and narratives that hold the violence.
- “We do not live in a country where prevention comes first,” he stated, highlighting that the eradication of violence demands multisectoral policies that involve the Ministries of Education, Health, Interior and Police, Labor, Congress and the private sector.
In his vision, the prevention begins by identifying and dismantling the beliefs that support the aggressor’s behavior and involves accompanying the emotional recovery of women and make them aware that violence It cannot be normalized or justified.
He recalled that the violence affects women of all social classes and educational levels, and that victimization is also sustained by real fearslike losing your job when you file a complaint. For this reason, he said, the response must be sustained and accompanied by permanent campaignspsychoeducation and institutional support.
Protections
The foster homes of the Women’s Ministry recorded almost 200 thousand assists legal, psychological and support in the first nine months of the 2023 to 2025. The data shows a sustained increase in the demand for care.
In the period analyzed the legal assistance They added 135,886, becoming the most requested service for the victims.
This type of support went from 36,521 services in 2023 to just over 50,000 in 2025, an increase that reflects the growing need for support in judicial processes. The psychological care were 51,025 in the same interval while other assistance offered in the protected homes They totaled 12,921.
Despite the increase in these services, the protections issued by the authorities have been reduced. In 2023 1,384 measures were granted; In 2024 they decreased to 1,186 and in 2025 they were 1,023. Taken together, the foster homes processed 3,593 protections in three years, which represents a drop of 26% between the first and last year.
The number of women victims of violence that entered the system also decreased. In 2023 690 users were received; in 2024, 632; and in 2025, 541. Along with them, 1,548 arrived minors of 13 years and 179 adolescents, which shows the direct impact that domestic violence has on the sons and daughters of the victims.
In recent days, the authorities offered two different balances on the femicides registered in the Dominican Republic during 2025. Although the numbers do not coincide because they are databases with different methodologies, both reports point towards a reduction compared to last year.
On Monday, during the Security Task Force meeting, Interior and Police Minister Faride Raful presented the updated crime heat map. He reported that to date 49 femicides have been recorded, compared to 71 in the same period of 2024.
This figure comes from the operational registry of the National Police and includes violent deaths of women that could be linked to sexist violence, although several files are still under investigation. On Friday of the previous week, the Minister of Women, Mayra Jiménez, offered a different balance based on the Observatory of the Ministry of Women.
According to that cut, 53 women have been murdered so far this year, ten less than the 63 registered on the same date in 2024. This base includes only cases already classified as femicides after verification of the link between victim and aggressor, the motive and the typology. It is a more refined registry, but with longer confirmation times.
