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Nearly 29 million children with disabilities live in Eastern and Southern Africa. Each of them – like every child in the world – has the right to be nurtured and supported through responsive care and education, to receive adequate nutrition and social protection, and to enjoy play and leisure time. Too often, however, such rights are denied. The reasons vary: They include stigma, lack of accessible services, institutionalization and physical barriers. But the consequences are sadly consistent. When marginalized from society, these children’s chances to survive and thrive are diminished, along…
This presentation was given by Florence Martin of Better Care Network at the 6th International Conference of the International Society for Child Indicators in Montreal, Canada in June 2017. The presentation addresses the following questions:
1) What do patterns and trends in children’s living arrangements tell us about parental care in Eastern and Southern Africa?
2) What do they tell us about the role of extended family care (kinship care)?
3) What are possible implications for efforts to prevent child-parent separation and strengthen family care?
The presentation…
Abstract
Globally, there are many reasons children grow up without one or both parents. In higher-income nations, a parental break up is a major force behind non-nuclear family care arrangements whereas in low-income nations, higher death rates and the need to migrate for work may dictate whether or not children regularly see their parents, let alone live with them. Given the importance of children’s care arrangements for their development, this essay summarizes efforts to measure trends in children’s care arrangements in two regions of the world—Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.…
This study by UNICEF sought to identify key determinants of vulnerability among children –including those affected by HIV and AIDS – that can contribute to developing an improved global measure of vulnerable children in the context of HIV and AIDS. Data from the most recent available household surveys at the time of analysis was used from 11 countries – Cambodia, Central African Republic, Haiti, Malawi, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe – were pooled.
Based on the results of the pooled analysis, the key indicators of vulnerability for…
HIV can no longer be considered as a new or emerging disease in sub-Saharan Africa. More than two decades on from the start of the epidemic, several countries in Africa have maturing HIV epidemics with stable or declining incidence. During the HIV epidemic, families and households have continued to be formed and built, and have survived and dissolved, bearing and rearing children. They pass through various life-cycle stages while continuing to function as the primary units of reproduction and production.
Children who survived the risk of contracting HIV through mother-to-child…
We examine the impact of orphanhood on children’s school enrollment in 10 Sub-Saharan African countries. Although poorer children in Africa are less likely to attend school, the lower enrollment of orphans is not accounted for solely by their poverty. We find orphans are less likely to be enrolled than are non-orphans with whom they live. Consistent with Hamilton’s Rule, the theory that the closeness of biological ties governs altruistic behavior, outcomes for orphans depend on the relatedness of orphans to their household heads. The lower enrollment of orphans is largely explained caregivers…
The HIV/AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa has already orphaned a generation of children – and now seems set to orphan generations more. Today, over 11 million children under the age of 15 living in sub-Saharan Africa have been robbed of one or both parents by HIV/AIDS. Seven years from now, the number is expected to have grown to 20 million. At that point, anywhere from 15 per cent to over 25 per cent of the children in a dozen sub-Saharan African countries will be orphans – the vast majority of them will have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS. Africa’s Orphaned Generations reports on the…