Rape support groups have expressed “serious concerns” over self-swab ‘rape kits’ being marketed towards university students in the UK.
The kits allow people who have been sexually assaulted or raped to take a swab themselves and send it off to a lab to be tested for the DNA of the alleged perpetrator. Half the sample is frozen and can be kept for up to 20 years and handed to the police if the incident is later reported.
Such kits have been handed out to students on UK university campuses in recent months, with companies saying the kits act as a deterrent and provide a simpler way to report a rape.
However, Rape Crisis England and Wales has warned that although the kits might seem like a good idea, there are concerns about how they work.
It warned survivors that the kits may not be able to collect the evidence needed to prove rape and that any evidence gathered may not be legally admissible – giving them “false hope” that it could help in a legal case.
“Rape Crisis England & Wales (RCEW) are aware that in parts of the country, self-swab ‘rape kits’ are beingmarketed to students and universities as a way for survivors – primarily, but not always, women and girls – to report rape, and to deter rapists,” a statement issued by Rape Crisis said.
“Although a self-swab kit might seem like a good idea, evidence collection needs to be done in a safe and legally compliant way for it to have most use in criminal trials.”
It added: “At-home kits can’t offer that level of protection and may give survivors false hope that any evidence they gather could be relied on in a criminal trial.”
It said this was because professional forensic medical examinations take place in forensically cleaned, controlled environments with strict rules to avoid contamination, making the evidence reliable.
Unlike self-swab kits, they also include assessments of injuries, clothing, blood samples, and other medical findings.
The kits have emerged amid a low rate of convictions for rape, with as many as five in six UK victims choosing not to report a rape at all.
In 2024, 71,227 rapes were recorded by police, but only 2.7 per cent of these had resulted in charges by the end of the year.
Companies selling the kits say they provide survivors with a “simpler, easier way to report and create real deterrence”.
Enough, a company that has handed out free kits at the University of Bristol and also sells them online for £20, says their main aim is to act as a deterrent, not to provide criminal justice.
It told The Independent that 70 per cent of polled students in Bristol said the kits had prevented sexual violence on campus, 90 per cent are aware of the not-for-profit and over 200 reports have been made in just six months.
“Survivors are asking for Enough. The most common question they ask is ‘how does this not already exist?’ They thank Enough for stopping young women being raped.” Katie White, the Enough co-founder said.
Its website says that if a person is seeking to report a rape to the police, they should go to a Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC) first.
It also says that leading KCs had confirmed DNA evidence collected by its kits – which are made by the same forensic experts that make them for the police – may be admissible at trial, but there are no guarantees of this.
Rape Crisis said while these self swap kits may provide DNA evidence, it is rarely used in rape trials as they cannot prove any activity was non consensual.
Although Enough points people to where they can get further support on its website, Rape Crisis also raised concerns that the kits don’t offer specialist, in-person support: “Survivors need trauma-informed care, reassurance, and to be heard and believed. A self-swab kit can’t provide emotional support or explain next steps, but a trained support worker in a Rape Crisis centre, or an Independent Sexual Violence Advocate (ISVA) can.”
Rape Crisis is the latest organisation to voice its concern over the kits, after the Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine (FFLM) issued a joint statement on the issue last year.
It said it did not currently support the use of self-swab kits, and it could “put survivors at risk” if they did not have the correct information.
