Endangered species

Four months ago, three children between the ages of five years old and one year old were removed from their parents’ home and taken into the care of the state after signs of physical abuse – being burned in the face – were discovered on one of the children; their father was subsequently charged and is currently before the court. Since then, instead of their physical and mental condition improving, it has emerged that the three infants might have been further abused by the system. It appears that their removal might have been too much of an emotional wrench and that the children grieved, did not thrive and became malnourished to the point where they have since had to be hospitalised.

That this was occurring while the Neesa Gopaul case was also being ignored is a further indictment of the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security and the Child Care and Protection Agency (CCPA). This case has also forcefully brought home the point – which this column has made ad nauseam – that this ministry and its much-hyped agency do not have the necessary resources to successfully undertake their mandate.

The three children in the present case were placed in the Guyana Red Cross Society (GRCS) Children’s Convalescent Home. Originally, intended for the convalescence of sick children, this institution has long been overtaken by the more pressing needs of caring for children who have been abandoned, orphaned, or whose parents are unable to care for them. It is not a state institution, but over the years it has been taking children referred by the state agency, which does not have its own home.

What is not clear is how this referral system works. However, in an invited comment to this newspaper after we learned of the children’s predicament, the head of the GRCS Mrs Dorothy Fraser indicated that the officers of the state agency would have had responsibility for the children.

One would imagine that this would translate to the officer handling the case being tasked with visiting the children at intervals to check on their condition. Obviously, this was not being done. If it had been then the officer would have known that the children were grieving to the point that they were not taking in nutrition and some alternative intervention could have been pursued – one would assume.

What is disturbing, is that these children virtually went from the Convalescent Home – ‘the state’s care’ – to the hospital after an astute day care official noticed their extremely unfavourable physical condition. Granted, the CCPA had overall responsibility for the children, but surely when it agreed to take the children in, the home assumed some responsibility for their primary physical well-being. Is there no networking mechanism in place that allows the home to call the CCPA and demand that some attention be paid to children who are obviously not responding? Mrs Fraser said it was “virtually impossible” for the children not to have received a proper diet while being in the Red Cross Convalescent Home and “highly impossible” for them to become malnourished while resident there. This does not explain why these children appear to have been ignored. Mrs Fraser admitted that children have been taken into the home with scabies – a highly contagious skin condition. The three children currently in the hospital obviously left the home with a skin condition. This points to the need for a review of the medical and hygienic conditions in these institutions.

Some two years ago, in June 2008, the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security launched its ‘Minimum Operational Standards & Regulations for Children’s Homes in Guyana’ booklet by which it proposed to regulate orphanages. While it had said that compliance with the standards was voluntary, the ministry had warned that it would move to the courts if necessary to ensure that children in orphanages lived in a stable and happy environment.

What are the minimum standards, one wonders, which the ministry sets for itself? It is incomprehensible that the CCPA could have made arrangements to return the three children to their mother’s care and not know that the man charged with abusing one of them was back in the home to which they were being returned. Was a visit paid to the home to see under what conditions these children were being returned? Was the case officer truly convinced of their mother’s ability to care for them? Or is this agency’s work being done from a desk in the city?

In a statement to this newspaper after being contacted the CCPA had said that the children’s mother had endangered them and was to be charged under Section 49 of the Protection of Children Act, while the children were to be returned to the state’s custody. One hopes that due care would now be exercised with these and all other children in unfortunate circumstances who now seem to have become an endangered species.