I don't know why Africans  like taskforces that don't transform into actual
do-something departments.  Everytime they have a problem, let's commission a
taskforce for a situation  paper. The situation remains or is forgotten. Any
country who does not care for  her orphans and disabled as a matter of national
policy is teetering on collapse  and abandon. I think there should be a
national budget item for SOS Children's  villages if national governments are
delinquent in caring for their own indigent  population. Kukeh, I found this
taskforce buried in the CSD website. Thought I  might share. Haruna. Thanks for the
referral.

International  concern about the consequence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on
children has been  rising. Increasing numbers of children are becoming orphans and
many others are  being made vulnerable by illness and death relating to HIV.
In sub-Saharan Africa there are also many other reasons  for parents of young
children to die.

Losing a parent has a devastating  impact on the life of a child, and has
repercussions for their community and  their country. There are also other groups
of children that are disadvantaged  who may be vulnerable, including disabled
children, those living in a household  headed by an elderly person or a
child, those not living with their biological  parents and those living in
households where adults are sick or may die. The  basic human rights of such
vulnerable children may be threatened.

In The  Gambia it is not uncommon for children to lose one or both of their
parents before  adulthood. Fathers are often substantially older than their
wives, and may die  of natural causes before their children are grown up; there
are many other  causes of death for parents of young children. The prevalence
of HIV is  relatively low, but rising. An estimated 15000 people are living
with HIV in The  Gambia, and an estimated 5000 children are AIDS orphans.

The Gambia set  up a National Orphan and Vulnerable Children (OVC) Taskforce
in 2002. This  Taskforce commissioned this situational analysis to understand
the current  situation of orphaned children in The Gambia and to assess
current models of  care.

This document reviews international  literature about OVC, the Gambian
literature on children, existing Gambian  policies and laws on children and existing
Gambian data on children to set the  scene for the examination of the new
data collected for the situational  analysis. The issue of OVC is seen to
threaten both individual child development  and national development. In The Gambia
high levels of vulnerability and poverty  have been described in many studies.
The Government of The Gambia has developed  relevant policies for Social
Welfare, Children, Education, Adoption, Youth,  AIDS, Nutrition and Inheritance.

Data from the National Censuses and from  the Multiple Indicator Cluster
Survey (MICS 2000) give useful background  information. Census data of 1993 showed
that 6.36% of all children below the age  of 18 were orphans (had lost mother
or father, or both); the MICS data showed  that 8% of those aged 0-14 were
orphans, while 73% of children were living with  both parents. The OVC showed
that orphans were significantly more likely to be  malnourished that
non-orphans.




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