An average of 38 children were abandoned by their parents each month last year and in the first half of this year, and a high percentage of them ended up dead, the Children’s Welfare League Foundation said yesterday, urging the public to pay more attention to the issue.
“Last year alone, 460 children were found abandoned shortly after birth, while the number of abandoned children reached 238 in the first half of this year” foundation executive director Alicia Wang (王育敏) told a news conference, citing Ministry of the Interior figures.
“It means as many as 698 children — or an average of 38 per month — were abandoned by their parents in just a year and a half,” she said.
The number doesn’t include children who were found dead or those who were handed over to relatives and are being well looked after, she said.
Although most of the abandoned children were found alive, Wang said about 23 percent of children found alive still died because most had been found along roadsides, in parks, public toilets, trash cans or in remote locations and were in terrible condition when discovered.
Investigating news reports about abandoned children over the past four years, the foundation found that about one-third of the children were born out of wedlock or from underage parents.
“These young parents are children themselves — they cannot afford to raise their children, could not educate their children and, in many cases, suffer from the bias of both society and their own families,” Wang said.
“Once they reach the breaking point and don’t know where to find help, they just abandon their kids,” she said.
The foundation said about 87 percent of children sent to their shelters this year came from families that were hard hit by the recession and could no longer afford to feed and shelter the children.
Wang urged the public to pay more attention to the problem of abandoned children.
She encouraged anyone willing to help these children to contact the foundation at (02) 2550-5959, ext. 1.
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