Valmiera/Latvia - Photo: Reinis Hofmanis
It is estimated that 1.3 million children in these areas are living in institutional care, i.e. they have been separated from their biological families. Aside from the fact that the standard of care provided often does not even meet minimum standards, in many cases the children could be prevented from being torn away from their families. With appropriate socio-educational intervention, suitable financial, advisory and other support services, it is often possible to save families that are on the brink of breaking up and to stabilise them on a long-term basis.
The political and economic transformation that has been seen in the former Soviet Union has led to many positive changes, but it has left a vacuum in many areas, particularly in the social system. Families that are poor or have no money at all are now worse off than they were 20 years ago. Poverty, unemployment, alcohol and drug abuse, and HIV/AIDS represent the greatest problems. The most affected are single parents and large families. This means that many families that live below the poverty line know little or nothing about how they can access the social services to which they are actually legally entitled.
Belarus: SOS social worker Tanya travels by bus for hundreds of kilometres to visit the families in their villages - Photo: Peter Lydén
"It is unbelievably common for people to be passive and ignorant of their basic rights. That is why many are worse off than they really need to be", explains Tanya, who works for the family strengthening programme that SOS Children's Villages Belarus has been running for several years in rural areas in particular. Social organisations tend to help in urban areas, which is why SOS Children's Villages Belarus is reaching out to support rural areas.
Estonia: Even if they are not single parents, women tend to be the ones who bear the brunt in families - Photo: Peter Lydén
Estonia, an EU Member State and in many areas a reformer par excellence, is fighting against a number of social issues. The number of alcoholics and drug addicts is very high in areas of the country that lack infrastructure and HIV infection rates are increasing. Ida is one of those that SOS Children's Villages Estonia cares for. She is young, a single mother, a drug addict, is unemployed and lives in cramped and dismal conditions with her mother and grandmother. Ida was placed on a methadone programme. Her family is being given food, is being educated about HIV and receives advice about social issues. Ida has now reached the stage of making plans for her future and her child's.
Romania: Large families are often put to the test when ends do not meet
Photo: Benno Neeleman
SOS Children's Villages' has been running a family strengthening programme in the Romanian capital Bucharest for the past three years. The Davidescu family was a beneficiary of the programme for two years until 2006, when the family reached the point when it no longer depended on the help of others. Prior to the programme, the family of eleven lived in extreme poverty: the parents lived with their nine children in a two-room house that leaked when it rained, none of the children went to school regularly and the hygiene conditions were dreadful. Different social services got in touch with SOS Children's Villages and the Davidescu family itself is now also working hard to change things - the support is only successful if the beneficiaries show self-motivation. Parents Nicolae and Alina became so much stronger that they were even able to help a single mother that was in a similar state of need as they had once been.
The names of the people featured in this article have been changed due to privacy reasons.
Part 2