The year is drawing to a close again, so it’s time to think back over what it brought us. It certainly was unlike anything we could have predicted a year ago. And while COVID-19 as a disease does not hit children as hard as it does adults, children have been very severely affected by the pandemic, the restrictions to keep it under control, and the actions, or lack thereof, with regards to mitigating the impact on the population.
What is particularly interesting to me – and to my work – is the effect that the pandemic has had on deinstitutionalisation. The bizarre thing is that essentially it has had two major effects on it, each in completely opposite directions. On the one hand, many institutions in the process of transitioning to family-based care froze that process in March – even though for some children everything was already in place and they would under normal circumstances have left the institutions within a week or two – and kept it in stasis ever since. Plus many institutions that were in the early stages of starting a transition to family-based care or were about to start it, and never did because of the changed circumstances.
While on the other hand, there has been an enormous wave of ‘rapid returns’: children being sent back to their families from institutions with little or no preparation, support or ongoing monitoring. Rapid return happened because of orders coming from the government or local authorities, because for-profit ‘orphanages’ no longer were profitable due to travel restrictions and lack of donors, and because residential institutions (where children lived for years without ever seeing their families) called themselves boarding schools and all schools were closed for lockdown. These rapid returns came with very serious risks to the children (as you can read about HERE, HERE and HERE).
Both these reactions were extreme, unnecessary and with a potential to do serious harm to children. I particularly found the rapid return reaction fascinating – though scary -, and I have spent many, many days trying to mitigate the risks to children. Many stakeholders who for years had dismissed any arguments that moving children out of institutions would be in their best interest and create much better outcomes suddenly slammed their foot on the accelerator and came with all the same arguments they had so far fought against to claim that children needed to be moved out of institutions within the next week, fortnight, month or 100 days. All of a sudden the message was heard, which is positive, but the action taken was supercharged and flew completely off the rails.
At this point in time, it is hard to imagine what 2021 will bring us. I guess all we can do is be prepared for anything and ready to get into action when new problems pop up, much as I have been doing for the past year.
In a personal sense, this is a time of great change too. I have just moved from Scotland back to the EU, to be closer to my family and friends, and to escape the consequences of Brexit that are about to hit full force. In this aspect of my life, things are far from clear either, for the moment I’m still staying with family while I look for a place to settle.
But both personally and professionally I am hopeful that 2021 will bring new opportunities and a chance to start building back better, particularly for the most vulnerable children.
I wish you a hopeful, healthy and loving year ahead.
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