Early years
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© UNICEF/Romania001/Bivol |
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At a UNICEF supported kindergarten |
The early childhood years, the period from pregnancy until the transition to school is complete, are very formative years. The young child must receive love and care in a protective family environment to be able to develop both physically, emotionally and cognitively into a unique individual, with self-esteem and confidence.However, because both family situations and care practices among vulnerable families and communities in Romania are extremely weak, this protective environment is limited.
The continuing high rate of children being abandoned and placed in institutions points to a lack of preventive services. More than 60% of mothers who abandoned their children had never had any pre-natal medical examination.A 2005 child abandonment study found that more than 60% of mothers who abandoned their children had never had any pre-natal medical examination. The study also found that most maternity wards did not have rooming-in facilities, where the mother and her child can stay together, and this actually encourages the separation of the mother from her child. The environment in a maternity hospital is important when attempting to prevent child abandonment and subsequent institutionalization. Social services providing monitoring, assistance and support to pregnant women at risk of abandoning their children have only recently been developed. The number of mother and baby centers increased slowly but steadily in recent years, although this is still far from sufficient and these are located only in cities. Day centers for vulnerable children have been established rapidly (125 centers in 2004), although most of these are in urban areas. There has been a significant drop in the number of crèches and kindergartens, which could be used to provide similar services, and a major problem is that crèches are too costly for those parents in greatest need.
