MDRI Executive Director Eric Rosenthal said the conditions in which the children were living in the psychiatric facilities in Romania were the worst he's seen anywhere in the world. And he says the treatment of the children witnessed by MDRI members constituted a violation of international human rights law.
MDRI Associate Director Laurie Ahern was one of those who visited the Romanian facilities. "The most prominent one, probably the most obviously horrific conditions, that was June '05 in [the southeast town of] Braila, where we found children in just horrendous conditions, and some near death," she said.
In an interview with RFE/RL's Romania-Moldova Service, Ahern said MDRI worked with the UN children's agency, UNICEF, to get these children transferred to other facilities. "These children were starving to death when we found them," she said. "They are better in the sense that these children are now being fed, and they're gaining weight."
Permanently Institutionalized
But she added that "what isn't better, at least when we spoke to the staff at the new institutions that they were at, is that these children will most likely be kept in institutions. There is a belief there that because a child has a disability, it seems that they can't live in a maternal or foster-care program, and it seems like these children will be kept in institutions. At least that's what we're told."
Children confined in cribs at Sasca Mica Rehabilitation Center, 2005 (MDRI)Ahern said all of the children she saw were capable of living in the community, going to schools, staying with their families, or being adopted. At one psychiatric facility in Timisoara, she said, 65 babies and infants were being looked after by only three staff members. "All they can do is feed them and change their diapers," Ahern continued. "That's the only thing they can do. So there were 65 babies, and there was this eerie silence. There was no noise. There was no crying. There were no babies cooing.
"And you could see as you looked at the babies -- from the younger ones up to the older ones -- by the time we went into the room with the 2-year-olds, who had been laying in cribs for two years, without anyone touching them or picking them up, other than to put a bottle in their mouth and change a diaper, these children were rocking back and forth, they were banging their heads, they were chewing their fingers," she said. "And this is a sign of neglect."
Ahern said such conditions breed further emotional and physical disabilities.
Bringing In Brussels


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It's simple: Write 'I Care' on a white piece of paper with black marker and have a friend snap a photo of you. We will post your photo along with hundreds of others. Together they will form a powerful visual of community and hope.








