I don't agree with sterilisation- as others have said, it isn't only parents who abuse/ neglect children, unfortunately.
I also don't think it's particularly productive to blame SS- they are doing a difficult job, and I imagine many of the people they are dealing with are evasive and good at covering up what is going on, not to mention also potentially violent. Also, legalities are often working against the social workers, and everyone knows their rights nowadays, don't they?
I do think society as a whole should feel some shame- we seem to keep so much to ourselves nowadays, and noone wants to "interfere" or been seen to interfere. Surely someone somewhere must notice if this level of abuse is happening in their street/ community? Or have we really come that far that these children and their woes are invisible to the rest of us? I know SS are paid to deal with these cases, but that shouldn't let the rest of us off the hook.
The thing that shocks me most in all this is the doctors who are paid to be the experts and who don't even bother examining the child- no excuse for that in my book. They need to do their job properly too. I don't see it as being just one person's fault- these cases shouldn't be able to all through so many potential safety nets- local community, then SS, then medical professionals. AS for the parents/ people responsible- yes, they are the scum of the earth and I could never understand or find it in myself to forgive them, but thankfully that's not up to me. I agree with locking them up and forgetting about them, and focussing on the victims, for whom we CAN do something.
Bit of an aside, but I recently watched the Holloway thing on young female offenders, and was depressed at how many of them had beem oon the "at-risk" register since they were babies, but only taken from their abusive/ neglectful parents when they were 14 or so, and had endured years of it- which seemed to be too late, if they fact they ended up screwed up and in jail was anything to go by