Kaiserslautern celebrates new women's emergency hotline: A shelter for everyone!

Kaiserslautern celebrates new women's emergency hotline: A shelter for everyone!

Kaiserslautern can be proud of a new contact point for women and girls: the women's emergency hotline, which was founded in September 2025 and was ceremoniously inaugurated at the beginning of November. This facility aims to provide support and advice in the event of sexual violence. The committed Meike Camby fought for the establishment for over seven years and thus made a decisive contribution to one of the most important social institutions in the region. Kaiserslautern is now the last regional center in Rhineland-Palatinate that can call such a specialist and advice center for sexual violence its own. This fact once again highlights the importance of the women's emergency hotline, as it is the first facility to combine advice from the women's emergency hotline and the women's shelter under one roof, as SWR reports.

A big advantage of the new structure is the close cooperation between the women's emergency hotline and the sponsoring association of the Kaiserslautern women's refuge. Those responsible want to make violence against women more visible and use synergies. Myriam Jung, one of the main actors, emphasizes that attacks are often denied or overlooked. It is all the more important that affected women and girls aged 14 and over can make use of the newly created advice center, even if they are not sure whether they have been victims of sexual violence. The competent counselors listen carefully to the women and offer individual support. There are also advice options for relatives and specialists. Information about this can be found on the women's emergency hotline website, which allows, among other things, telephone and personal conversations.

Unique offers for those affected

The concept of the women's emergency hotline includes not only advice, but also prevention work and education. The specialist center actively addresses various contexts of sexual violence, for example in private, professional or public spaces, which underlines the relevance of the institution in society. The creators also see themselves as having a socio-political responsibility to raise awareness of the issue and strengthen women. A key aspect is that the women's emergency hotline respects all gender identities, including women*, girls* and TIN* (transsexual, intersex, non-binary people). This is an important step towards an inclusive understanding, as can be found on the Women Against Violence page.

The organization is financed by the Rhineland-Palatinate Ministry for Family, Women, Culture and Integration as well as by the Bürgerhospital Foundation and the Kaiserslautern Victim Protection Foundation. However, in order to further expand and consolidate the offerings, additional funding is necessary, as the Women's Minister Katharina Binz emphasized at the opening. Given the fact that until recently Kaiserslautern was the only regional center in Rhineland-Palatinate without a women's emergency hotline, the founding of this facility is a real milestone in the fight against violence against women. Not only is help offered here, but we also actively work on social perception in order to reduce fear of contact and offer women a protected space.

For all women and girls who need support, the nationwide helpline “Violence against Women” is available around the clock on 116 016. This means that an important hurdle has been overcome, as affected women now have easy access to the help they need.