There are an estimated 2.6 million Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) in Kenya, of whom 650,000 are orphaned by AIDS. More than one million households care for an orphan. In the absence of a coordinated multi-sectoral response, OVC are at risk of: (1) not knowing their HIV status; (2) delayed treatment; (3) economic difficulty due to caregiver illness and death; (4) family separation; and/or (5) situations that put them at greater risk of protection violations and HIV infection (school dropout, early marriage, risky behaviors).
Children affected by HIV and AIDS often live in households undergoing dramatic changes, such as intensified poverty; increased responsibilities placed on young members of the family; poor parental health that may increase emotional or physical neglect; stigma and discrimination from friends, community members, or extended family; and parental death. These changes often result in reduced household capacity to meet children’s basic needs. Orphaned children may undergo a transition to a new household or, in relatively few cases, be forced to head their own households. Orphans are more likely to live in households with higher dependency ratios, may experience property dispossession, often miss out on opportunities for education, may live in households experiencing food insecurity, and often experience decreased emotional and psychological well-being due to such dramatic life changes, challenges, and losses.
With an emphasis on increasing OVC access to essential services, Blue Cross CDP expands on government services to vulnerable children by ensuring OVC in all age groups have access to basic needs.
Services are offered to OVC as a package; thus, every beneficiary receives at least four essential services. Direct services delivered to all identified beneficiaries include psychosocial support, health care, HIV prevention education, and educational support in secondary and tertiary levels. Many beneficiaries are also reached by child protection initiatives.
Blue Cross CDP aims to ensure children remain healthy, safe, stable and schooled by: addressing the social determinants of health to improve the wellbeing of children orphaned and made vulnerable by HIV; enhance the capacity of caregivers and communities to sustainably provide care and support to OVC; and strengthen institutional capacities of formal and informal structures to respond to child welfare and protection needs.
- Food and nutritional support
- Shelter and care
- Child protection
- Health care
- Psychosocial support
- Education and vocational training
- Economic strengthening
- Family services
