What we know about orphans…

There is very little official information available about orphans' needs and the scope of their problems. In general, getting accurate and complete statistics on social issues in Russia is a challenging endeavor, and the statistics on orphans seems to be especially incomplete, confusing and outdated. That is why I was so excited to see the first extensive statistical research on Youth in Russia, recently published by the Russian Federal Statistics Bureau: New Research. Though it still doesn’t contain information specific to orphans, it's nonetheless a great step towards understanding Russian youth in general. The authors of the research admitted that this was the first attempt to collect such data and that it made them realize how little they knew about Russian youth. Some of the numbers point to positive changes, such as some decrease in use of drugs and alcohol, and the number of HIV-positive among young people between 15 and 29 years old. Other numbers cause serious concern about suicide, abortions by young women (15-17 years old) and divorce among young people. The Russian officials are also concerned about the rate of crime committed by young people and rate of violence towards children.

Good or bad, the more accurate statistics does help us see where acute needs are but what really motivates us in our work is the personal story of every young person we know.