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For street children in Hanoi, Vietnam is falling far short of its obligations under Vietnamese and international law, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Between 2003 and 2006, Human Rights Watch received credible reports of serious abuses of street children in Hanoi. Primarily poor children from the countryside who go to Hanoi to find work, street children are routinely and arbitrarily rounded up by police in periodic sweeps and sent to two compulsory state “rehabilitation” centers on the outskirts of town, Dong Dau and Ba Vi social protection centers, where they…
Largely as a result of being cut off from the protection and care of their families, communities, and friends, children in institutions are increasingly vulnerable to HIV. In institutions, services to educate children on HIV/AIDS prevention, as well as appropriate treatments for children already infected, tend to be limited in scope and access. Many children are not even informed of their HIV status.
This assessment aims to map the vulnerability of children in three types of institutions, to identify critical needs, and to design practical, rapid, and easy-to-implement solutions that…
Part of a series of ‘How-to’ Guides that highlight successful initiatives by Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and its implementing partners from around the world, this Guide provides practical strategies and tips emerging from CRS/Vietnam’s experience with inclusive education for children with disabilities.
In the past, it was accepted that children with disabilities belonged in special programmes that separated them from their peers; however, international education experts now believe that inclusive education programmes are not only more cost effective for developing countries, but also…
The primary objective of this study was to provide an overview of institutional and alternative care for Children in Need of Special Protection. In line with the United Nations guidelines to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the study was designed to assist and encourage the government of Viet Nam to develop policies and programs and to channel more resources to support family and community-based care.
HIV vulnerability refers to the factors that make it more likely that an individual or group will be infected or affected by HIV/AIDS. Reducing HIV vulnerability thus often entails the improvement of structural elements in an individual’s context or environment. Promoting correct knowledge about HIV and STIs is the easiest part, and many organizations focus on education-based interventions. It has been widely recognized, however, that factors like gender (i.e. being a woman or a man, being homosexual or heterosexual), poverty or access to education have an equally important influence on…
As the HIV/AIDS epidemic strikes at the heart of family and community support structures, large numbers of older people are assuming responsibility for bringing up orphans and vulnerable children. Family structures are changing. Often the middle generation – both men and women – is completely absent, leaving the old and young to support each other.
This means that families of older carers and orphans and vulnerable children are compelled to take on new roles. Older people make up a significant proportion of the poorest, and HIV/AIDS exacerbates the extreme poverty faced by older-…
The world’s governments have promised to provide improved protection to children in difficult circumstances and tackle the root causes leading to such circumstances. Failure to act – to back up the good intention with practical measures that bring about a safer world for children – really does not honour the world’s promise to the child, nor the promise and potential of the child. In ten years, will the Secretary General of the United Nations again need to say to the children of the world, “We have failed you”?
Children at Risk is a follow-up to World Vision’s earlier…
Statistics from the 1999 Census show that Vietnam has 27,423,000 children, or 36% of the country’s total population of 76,328,000. The number of vulnerable children is 2.5 million or 3% of the total population and 9% of the child and adolescent population. These include: 133,000 orphans; around 1,200,000 children with disabilities, among which are 182,501 children with serious disabilities; and 21,000 street children, including 3,000 young drug addicts, 2,500 HIV/AIDS-infected children; and sexually abused children and children of poor families. Many factors have contributed to putting these…
"Child representatives and care leavers from South East Asia have called for increased support for continuing education, psychosocial care, finding jobs and affordable housing in the wake of COVID-19," according to this news article from SOS Children's Villages. Their recommendations were discussed with Asian government and civil society representatives in an online forum entitled COVID-19 Response towards the Alternative Care of Children in South East Asia, held on 28 July 2020. The forum, organized by SOS Children's Villages in association with the South East Asian member…
In this article from the Guardian, Do Duy Vi, a former street child himself, shares how he he seeks out vulnerable young people in Vietnam’s capital in the hopes of offering them shelter and a new beginning.