The Orphan Crisis in Zambia- JCTR Bulletin42

THE ORPHAN CRISIS IN ZAMBIA

In the following article, Michael Kelly, S.J., looks at the devastating effects of HIV/AIDS on families and children, especially that the epidemic is occurring at a time of almost universal poverty. Michael discusses how the AIDS pandemic makes poverty even deeper and more dehumanising. He examines how the loss of productive adults and the costs involved in caring for the sick and burying the dead have eaten away at families' few resources, leaving survivors with their hearts torn out and their ability to cope almost shattered. The majority of these survivors are the children whom we call orphans. Hence the upsurge of the orphan population and the crisis that this brings about.

When the people of Japan awoke on the morning of 7 August 1945, they did not know that that was to be a day of catastrophic doom for one of their cities. It was on that day that an atom bomb devastated Hiroshima, taking 92,000 lives. When the people of Zambia awake each day, are they aware that because of HIV/AIDS they face an even more calamitous situation?

The number of new HIV infections is believed to lie between 300 and 500 per day.

THE NATURE OF THE CRISIS

More than fifteen years have passed since the first AIDS case was diagnosed in Zambia. Since then the epidemic has spread to all parts of the country. Some parts are worse hit than others, but no part is exempt. The current estimate is that one out of every five of those between the ages of 15 and 49 is infected. This amounts to almost 1,000,000 infected adults. In addition, 70,000 young children have been infected through their mothers.

The Ministry of Health's sober estimate is that almost all of these people will die within the next ten years, with the number of deaths due to AIDS rising from its current 200 per day to nearly 350 per day by 2005. Meanwhile, the number of new HIV infections is believed to lie between 300 and 500 per day. This is no longer leading to an increase in the prevalence rate because the rising number of AIDS deaths is offsetting the number of new infections.

The effects on families and children are devastating. The epidemic is occurring at a time of almost universal poverty, and its effect is to make that poverty even deeper and more dehumanising. The loss of productive adults and the costs involved in caring for the

The large proportion of orphaned children gives Zambia the unhappy distinction of being the most orphaned country in the world.

sick and burying the dead have eaten away at families' few resources, leaving survivors with their hearts torn out and their ability to cope almost shattered. The majority of these survivors are the children whom we call orphans.

ORPHANHOOD

An orphan is a child who has lost one or both parents. A maternal orphan has lost the mother, a paternal orphan the father. A child who has lost both parents is sometimes referred to as a double orphan. It is very likely that a child who has lost one parent because of AIDS will soon become a double orphan, since the likelihood of the surviving parent being HIV-infected is also high.

Some children are multiple orphans. They became orphans through the death of one or both parents. This led to their being incorporated into the family of relatives. In several cases, AIDS claims these relatives also, and once again the child is orphaned. Some children have had repeated experience of this.

Estimates vary as to the number of orphans in Zambia. One estimate is that 1.656 million children, or more than one-third of those under the age of 15, are orphans who have lost one or both parents.

Less than one quarter of the orphans have lost their parent or parents to other forms of sickness or accidents, while more than three-quarters are orphans because of AIDS. The large proportion of orphaned children gives Zambia the unhappy distinction of being the most orphaned country in the world.

Instead of getting smaller, or at least not increasing, the problem of orphanhood is increasing rapidly. Between 1996 and 1998, there was a national increase of over fifteen percent in the number of orphans. This was a very large increase in such a short time.

The situation was even worse in the Southern Province where there was a thirty percent increase. This continued rapid growth in the scale of the orphans problem means that Zambia is likely to retain its position as the most heavily orphaned country in the world for at least the coming ten years, with the proportion of orphaned children rising to more than 38%.

ORPHANS AND VULNERABLE CHILDREN

The orphans and vulnerable children situation in Zambia is of such magnitude that it poses a national challenge which few other countries have had to face. Certain key factors have to be borne in mind when considering this challenge:

· the vulnerability of all children in Zambia is very high because of worsening economic and agricultural conditions;

· the proportion of children who have lost one or both parents is so high that considering them a target group may not be useful—the attitude of communities is that help should be given to the child in need, whether this need arises from being an orphan or from some other cause;

· apart from orphans there are many other vulnerable children in Zambia - street children (75,000 to 90,000), children who are physically or sexually abused (there has been a large increase in the media reports on these), child labour (on the increase as AIDS-related mortality pushes an increasing number of young children into income-generating activities outside the home), and disabled children (mostly invisible and anonymous, their number unknown, but almost certainly exceeding 150,000)

· there is little merit, and there are ethical problems, in drawing a distinction between those orphaned due to AIDS and those orphaned due to other causes. As far as possible, the term "AIDS orphan" should be avoided when dealing with individual children, with families, with communities, with pupils in schools, or with those being treated in health institutions.

THE NEEDS OF ORPHANS

The needs of orphans are;

· the needs of households in poverty, for food, shelter, accommodation, clothing;

· the needs of any child under age 15, for health care and schooling;

· the needs of any young person for access to work; and

· the psychological needs arising from their orphan status.

Orphans suffer more deprivations than non-orphaned children. They may receive less food than others or be segregated at meal times. They are more likely not to be enrolled in school and not to have exercise books or pencils. They may be required to undertake a larger share of household chores. They are likely to lose the property they should have inherited from their deceased parents.

Orphans who have lost their mothers are at a higher risk of sickness and are less likely to get immunisations. Orphans who have lost their fathers are less

Coming on top of the AIDS problem, the orphans crisis poses a serious threat to this future.

likely to have somebody to pay their school fees. Orphans who are living with grandparents, especially elderly grandmothers, are particularly vulnerable because of the inability of the grandparents, at their age, to provide for the material, social and psychological needs of another generation of children.

Orphans have unique psychological needs. The death of parents plunges them into grief and removes one of the basic anchors in their lives. Often this is made worse when they are separated from their siblings.

They experience deep trauma from the harrowing experience of seeing a parent suffering in the final stages of an AIDS death. In their new circumstances, they may not be able to find anything to replace the love, attention and affection which they received from their parents. They are in urgent need for the child counseling that would provide them with special psychological support.

There is also need for this help to be provided before the parent actually dies. Parents need to be helped to talk out with their children that they (i.e., the parents) or other close members of the family may die very soon. Children need to be helped face up to the real possibility that their parents or other loved ones may die very soon.

CARING FOR ORPHANS

The ideal situation is for orphans to remain with or be incorporated into a family with which they have blood ties, to stay with their own siblings, and to live in the familiar surroundings of a known community. In other words, the family is the first line of response to the crisis. Institutional care should be considered only in two circumstances: as a temporary arrangement while negotiations are under way for the within-family placement of an orphan; and as a reluctant arrangement of last resort, when all else fails.

The brunt of the orphans problem is being borne by the extended family and communities, which despite the enormous pressures being placed on them are coping in truly heroic fashion. They have responded magnificently to the double crisis of losses to AIDS and increases in the number of orphans, standing fast in the face of the huge pressures being placed on them, and coping with the problems almost as part of their normal routine.

Because the family and the extended family provide the most important response to the orphans problem, all policies, strategies and interventions should focus on strengthening their structure and operations, both as entities in themselves and as part of the community, so that they can adequately discharge their child protection and care roles.

4. Income-generating activities and well-run micro-credit schemes are powerful tools for boosting the capacity of families and communities to manage their own problems. Assistance which is directed along these lines appears to work more effectively in generating employment and reducing poverty than other targeted non-credit schemes (such as food aid). However, for such schemes to work properly it is crucial that income-generating activities be treated as serious business ventures which are evaluated on the basis of their commercial feasibility and which are managed by persons with the time, skills and motivation to make them profitable.

5. The bulk of activities directed towards mitigating the orphans problem are the work of civil society—NGOs and community-based organisations (CBOs). However, the current response of NGOs, religious institutions and donors is random, with little co-ordination or geographic focus.

6. There is great need to strengthen NGOs and CBOs (in such areas as community mobilisation, participatory action, financial management, records management, financial planning) so that they can become even more responsive to local needs. As things stand, most of these organisations learn by doing and have had little opportunity or incentive to evaluate the impact of their approach.

7. There is little evidence of active government involvement in responding to the orphans problem. Currently there is no national government mechanism for the co-ordination of support to orphans and vulnerable children. Consultation, collaboration and linkages between government ministries, and between government and NGOs working in this area are weak.

WHAT CAN WE, AS CHRISTIANS, DO?

As with AIDS, no part of Zambia is exempt from the orphans crisis. It is found in every community and in almost every household. It is found in every parish. In the early church, the local Christian community took into its care any child who had lost one or both parents.

This was their way of recognising in practice that God is the Father of orphans (Psalm 68: 6). Given the scale of the problem, this is not possible in Zambia. But it is possible for every parish to set up structures, make collections, and establish income-generating enterprises that will support families and communities in looking after their orphans. Nothing works better here than strengthening the family, something that is excellent in its own right, and particularly so in the light of the exhortations of the African Synod.

On top of this, there is need for co-ordination of effort and for sharing of information on what works and what does not work. Without pinning too much faith on structures and committees, there seems to be need for some kind of overall co-ordinating activity at all levels - small Christian community, parish, diocese, nation.

The health desk in the Catholic Secretariat may be able to deal with some of this, but something more may be required. Though the orphans crisis is largely due to the number of AIDS deaths, what is at issue here is care for the living and healthy.

More fundamentally, what is at issue is the future - the life, the hope of families, of communities, of the future for Zambia. Coming on top of the AIDS problem, the orphans crisis poses a serious threat to this future. What kind of response can we provide, as concerned Christians inspired by the special concern that the good Lord always showed for children?

M. J. Kelly, S.J.
School of Education
University of Zambia

From the Editor | Table of Contents | Next Article