Every child needs a family

THANK you for highlighting the plight of children in orphanages who are not adopted or fostered because they are deemed too old (“We are nobody’s children”; The Star, Dec 29).

OrphanCare Foundation was set up to give orphans and abandoned babies in Malaysia the love, care and security of a family in line with our tagline, “Every Child Needs a Family”. We work closely with the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry to realise these objectives.

Our mission is two-fold: to place orphans into loving homes, as an orphanage can never replace a family; and to provide a refuge for unwed mothers and a safe haven for babies who may otherwise be abandoned.

On Nov 11, Malaysia Adoption Day (MAD) 2016 was initiated by OrphanCare Foundation, with the full support of the ministry, with the following objectives:

> To raise awareness and promote positive perception on adoption of children and orphans from orphanages in Malaysia. We would like to encourage more people to adopt, especially older children and children with manageable physical disabilities, from orpha­nages in Malaysia.

> To educate society on the harm, mentally and physically, suffered by children and orphans left growing and aging out in orphanages.

> To create interest on this topic, to trigger talks, debates, discussions and forums on the national level to garner support from the Govern­ment, like-minded non-governmental organisations, communities, businesses and individuals.

Our hopes for MAD are to recruit the public to spread the word about adoption in particular, and OrphanCare Foundation’s mission in general, on their social networking account and for people to share their stories to inspire others.

We hope that people will be moved to celebrate MAD annually by organising activities, recruitment campaigns and special events to highlight the plight of these children and orphans.

Research has shown that children left to grow in orphanages, deprived of loving parental care, suffer lifelong physical and psychological harm. Babies, in particular, fail to develop as they should without one-to-one parental interaction and recent research demonstrates the severe impact of institutionalisation on early brain development. Children from institutions suffer from poor health, physical under-development and deterioration in brain growth.

Orphanages should be the last resort for children and orphans. Children should not be isolated from the broader community. This is an outdated concept and is better replaced with family or family-based care.

A family environment provides a more comprehensive atmosphere, including care, love and basic needs for a child’s physical and mental advancement. There are many reasons why children are left in orphanages in Malaysia.

Although some of these children have families, they are unable to live with their families due to the parents’ inability to look after them. The main reason is poverty, so efforts must be made to reintegrate them with their families. This requires a supportive community support system, which is currently lacking. OrphanCare’s Pilot Project succeeded in reintegrating seven children with their birth families.

In the case of children who are adoptable, efforts must be focused on finding adoptive parents who will give them a proper home or they would be left in the orpha­nages until the age of 18, when they will be forced to leave to fend for themselves.

Studies consistently demonstrate that young people raised in institutions have much poorer outcomes than their peers raised in families, and are at much greater risk of unemployment and homelessness, sexual exploitation and trafficking and even suicide.

OrphanCare Foundation adheres to international best practices and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), i.e. adoption as a human right and that every child has a right to a family as a basic human right. The UNCRC states that “for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality”, the child should “grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding”.

OrphanCare Foundation’s biggest challenge is not just to find adoptive parents for older children and orphans, but also for adoptive parents willing to take in babies or children with manageable physical disabilities. We are hopeful and confident that with the launching of MAD, more people will respond and be willing to become adoptive parents to these children and orphans.

Therefore, we need help from the media to communicate information to the public, to counter the misconceptions about orphanages being set up “in the best interest of children and orphans” to highlight the plight of these children and orphans.

We are hopeful that increased media coverage will result in an understanding of the subject, resulting in empathy towards these children and orphans and more members of the community embracing them into their lives and providing them with a happy and stable home.

NORAINI HASHIM

Trustee/Head of Media Publicity & Fundraising

OrphanCare Foundation