Does a US child go missing every 90 seconds?

A television news channel in Washington DC recently launched a safety awareness campaign using the hashtag #every90seconds, claiming that one child goes missing in the US, on average, every one-and-a-half minutes.

It's a figure that's been widely quoted in US media over the past few years, often for the best of reasons, as in this case. It sounds worrying, because you might reasonably assume it refers to kidnappings, or children in real danger.

But where does the 90-second figure come from?

It's based on a 2002 study funded by the US Department of Justice. This examined data for 1999 from a range of sources, including police reports, and interviews with parents and children, and found 797,500 children were reported missing across the country. There hasn't been another major study since then.

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