At Hope and Homes for Children, we share people’s distress about the situation that was highlighted by the BBC documentary, Bulgaria’s Abandoned Children. However, we are pleased that the Bulgarian Government has made the decision to close the orphanage and that a closure programme is now underway.

Sadly, home for more than one million children in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) is a bleak state run institution. Institutions cause physical and mental harm, which can be irreversible.

Hope and Homes for Children believes that every individual child should benefit from the love and security of a family home. We work with communities, local authorities and national governments to prevent family breakdown, to tackle the causes of child abandonment, and to fight for children’s rights. We work to close institutions and assist authorities in establishing appropriate family-based services for orphaned and abandoned children, and for children with special needs.

By putting the needs and rights of children first, we have developed a pioneering method of deinstitutionalisation (closing institutions), which is supported by UNICEF and the World Health Organisation as a best practice model. We have used it to close 13 institutions to date across CEE, moving children into caring family environments whilst tackling the issues that lead to child abandonment.

As we progress, a key focus of our work is to build the capacity of state childcare professionals across CEE so that we can transform the lives of more children than ever before. We will continue to be engaged directly in the closure of the worst institutions in specific countries, but we will also work at a strategic level, ensuring that governments across the region take immediate action to transform outdated systems of childcare.

Please let us know if you would be interested to find out more about the situation regarding child institutions in CEE, and the work of Hope and Homes for Children in the area. Please give us your support to allow us to hasten the pace of change for children.

Still want to know more? Please feel free to request more information.

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