From our experience, we know that initially the violence starts off very subtly. We see the isolation and the psychological abuse, and over time it does escalate. I've been working in this field and with women for 22 years, and I learn from the women with lived experiences. I used to work in London and now I work in Windsor and Essex Country.
I can tell you that COVID-19 has, in some situations, escalated the severity. For some of our clients, we are seeing the severity of risk increase. We are seeing many more threats to kill, threats to harm. I don't know what the criminal statistics are in terms of convictions and charges, but we have seen an increase in the last little while in terms of the severity.
Violence against women and those severe cases and the complexity have always been there, but we are seeing much more, certainly, in Windsor and Essex County in terms of the dangers also with being across the border. Being close to the border, we are also seeing many more cases of human trafficking. That's something that we never used to see.