ORPHAN CARE – OVERVIEW OF THE NEED
By Tiffany Taylor

Millions of children are living in orphanages around the world with little hope for the future. These children are the innocent victims of social upheaval being felt throughout the world. Each child has a devastating story to tell.

The Overwhelming Need
There are more than 750,000 orphans living in Russian orphanages. Thirty percent of Russian orphan graduates turn to crime (boys join the mafia, girls become prostitutes). Sixty percent of these orphans end up jobless and homeless. Ten percent take their own lives. Today, thirteen million children are orphaned because of AIDS in Africa. Forty million AIDS orphans will be living in Africa by the year 2010. 50,000 children live in Romanian orphanages. Hundreds of thousands of little girls have been abandoned and live in Chinese orphanages. 22,000 children live in Guatemalan orphanages with abysmal facilities, overcrowding and desperate needs; 400 babies are abandoned monthly in Guatemala.

What Else Is Being Done to Help?
International adoption is just one solution to help these children. HUMANITARIAN AID programs support orphans through collections of shoes, clothing, food, developmental toys and medicine. MISSION TRIPS take individuals and groups on construction projects, medical improvement trips and orphan summer camps. ORPHANAGE IMPROVEMENT projects pay for upgrades to the physical buildings where the children live. SOCIAL SERVICE programs deliver foster care, independent living, foster grandmothers to orphanages.

Opportunities to help:

• Organize humanitarian aid drives through your school, organization and/or work.
• Go on a Mission Trip to pass out humanitarian aid and/or make repairs at the orphanages.
• Volunteer to sport and pack humanitarian aid.
• Make baby blankets, dolls or teddy bears for the orphanages.
• Sponsor a child through Foster Care or an Orphan graduate program.
• Purchase an item for an orphan through a catalog (ex Buckner’s “Dreams catalog”) in honor or memory of a friend, client or loved one.

Some Organizations that Help Orphans Overseas:

• Buckner Orphan Care International—www.helporphans.org
• Shoes for Orphan Souls—www.shoesfororphansouls
• Josh McDowell ministries—www.josh.org
• East-West Ministries—www.eastwestministries.org
• Half the Sky foundation—www.halfthesky.org
• Compassion international—www.compassion.com
• Slavic Gospel association—www.sga.org

Tiffany Taylor is the Marketing Director for Buckner Orphan Care International (www.helporphans.org) and Shoes for Orphan Souls. (www.shoesfororphansouls.org).