Children in Tajikistan try to cope with cold weather
UNICEF Tajikistan Communication Officer Parveena Muhammedkhajaeva visited schools and hospitals in areas of Rudaki, a district outside and surrounding the capital, Dushanbe, to find out how children were coping with the severe, cold weather conditions in the country. Here’s her account. “We arrived in Rudaki district at 10:00 am, on Wednesday, January 30, and saw all the roadside shops open and working using small generators for power. The first school we visited was Number 1, Rudaki district, which has 1,071 students (357 girls, 714 boys). Odinayev Badriddin is the school’s director. He told us school attendance has dropped to around 50-60 percent each day. The first thing that strikes you is the lack of central heating. All you see is empty hinges. It indicates the school does not have any heating. We entered the staff room. Teachers stood up and greeted us, myself and Mr Kholov from the Rudaki District Education Department. They offered us a cup of tea. We politely refused the offer of tea and after our introductions they each complained of the cold and lack of any electricity. They expressed their concern that children have to sit in very cold class rooms and that no government order had been issued to close schools. Teachers have to insist children come to school. For two weeks, school attendance has been low, as parents are are not allowing their children to attend. Today was sunny and classes catching the sun through their windows benefited from the welcome source of warmth. Teachers are trying their best to cope in the conditions, with lessons based on activities, rather than the usual focus on blackboard-based teaching and writing exercises. They asked each pupil not to take off their coats, hats, headdresses and gloves. The school decided to cut the duration of lessons from 45 minutes to 35 minutes. There is a residential boarding-school, or institution, next to this school, but we were informed children from the boarding school were sent “to visit relatives”. The boarding school is home to 289 children: 11 of which are orphans, 178 have one living biological parent (164 of them have no father and 14 have no mother), four of the children are disabled, and 96 are from poor families. The boarding school was closed owing to there being no electricity and a shortage of coal and wood for heater fuel. A director mentioned that he is looking for help to get coal or wood and is waiting for electricity supplies to restart.
We also visited maternity and children hospitals, which are supplied with electricity and all the wards were warm. Newborn children are kept warm by any possible means. We came across two UNICEF-provided incubators; one was already broken so two premature babies were placed in the remaining incubator. Other babies needing support will be warmed by bottles filled with hot water. A children’s hospital we visited was supplied with energy, 24 hours-a-day. Mothers say that hospitals have better conditions than homes and children admitted to the hospital are usually diagnosed with diseases resulting from the cold.
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