Families Not Orphanages

"A survey conducted in Uganda in 1992, in the wake of civil war and increasing AIDS mortality, found that approximately 2,900 children were living in institutional care. The survey also found that approximately half of these children had both parents living, 20 per cent had one parent alive and another 25 per cent had living relatives. Poverty was the reason most of these children were in residential care. Guided by these findings, a multi-year effort by the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs and Save the Children UK improved and enforced national policies on institutional care reunited at least 1,200 children with their parents or relatives and closed a number of sub-standard residential institutions. A 1993 evaluation found 86 percent of the children to be well integrated in their families. Unfortunately, some of this work in Uganda is now being reversed, and the trend of orphanages seems to be on the rise, apparently due to shifting priorities in policy implementation."

- Families Not Orphanages by John Williamson and Aaron Greenberg (2010)

Taken from the Better Care Network