September 2 2014

SOS Children’s Villages publish data on children without parental care in Africa

Assessments undertaken by SOS Children’s Villages as part of the Care for ME! campaign lay out in stark facts the deprivations and dangers for many hundreds of thousands of children without parental care in sub-Saharan African countries.

  • In Tanzania there are approximately 200,000 children living in households headed by a child.
  • In Zimbabwe 74% of all children without parental care have lost their parents due to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
  • The majority of cases of violence and abuse against children in Togo involve children not living with their biological parents.
These data and many more are presented in eight national Assessment Reports on the alternative care systems for children in Benin, The Gambia, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
 
Assessments of existing alternative care settings and their components were the first step before the countries could participate in the SOS Children’s Villages’ Care for ME! campaign to improve care on the national level for children without parental care.
 
In June 2014, SOS Children’s Villages’ Malawi launched a national Care for ME! campaign with a conference attended by global experts in alternative child care, and the publication of the report Drumming Together for Change, in which an overview of alternative care conditions in sub-Saharan African countries, along with practical recommendations for improvements, are presented.
 
These publications are being made freely available to SOS Children’s Villages member associations, as well as other NGO’s and international stakeholders.