Kivotos tou Kosmos is not the first child protection structure to be accused of mistreating guests. The prevailing question now is whether closed structures are the best way to protect children who are left unattended or who have already been abused. The risk of secondary “injury” to these children is reportedly higher in these structures. Why do child protection institutions often become breeding grounds for abuse? Seven experts explain.

Child psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Athanasios Alexandrides emphasizes that the pathogenicity of children’s “hotel” hostels created by various NGOs is due to many factors, the first of which is their “birth”. “They are usually created by two completely different groups – “humanist-idealists” and “opportunist-speculators,” he says to “K”. “Unfortunately, both converge on staffing dormitories with inadequate staff in terms of quantity and knowledge — the former because they believe their good intentions are enough, the latter because they want to pay less,” he says. The second pathogenic factor, “money”: “They invest foreign money, state, European or from donations, which are usually plentiful and uncontrolled in their use, and this, as you know, is a temptation to sin.” “The third pathogenic factor is the required operating permit and ongoing funding,” which, Mr. Alexandrides notes, creates dependency relationships with political forces and respective governments. These structures are designed to protect and treat children and adolescents who have received “multiple traumas at the physical, mental, moral, family and social level.”

“It is well known that child and adolescent abuse is widespread in institutions,” says Gerasimos Kolaitis, EKPA Child Psychiatry Professor and Director of the Child Psychiatry Clinic at Agia Sophia Hospital in K. According to him, the characteristics of inpatient care that we often encounter are the following: poor management of people, their depersonalization, the distancing of staff from them, the rigidity of their daily routine, which can ultimately be adapted to the needs of the nursing staff, who often, according to his words, not suitable for the number and education, and not for those who are taken care of. “So untrained caregivers – basically – don’t know how they should care for and manage these children with complex needs,” he stresses.

Alexandra Coroneu, professor of sociology and former dean of the School of Social Sciences at Panteillon University, refers to the concept of an integrated institution, a closed structure usually cut off from the outside world. Guests live there for a long time, the rules are strict, obedience is required and isolation reigns. “They function as structures of uniformity and subjection of individual behavior to rules and norms set by a higher authority, limiting the freedom that people have,” he says. At the same time, in a closed structure, “where you are not controlled and you have absolute power, the secret will be kept much longer,” he states, so they are a fertile environment for abuse. “It is much easier for a rapist,” he says, “to use children or adolescents who are in a state of slavery and dependence.”

The state should take responsibility for such unprotected and vulnerable people, says Vassilis Pavlopoulos, professor of intercultural psychology at EKPA. “It puts this responsibility on the benevolence of various people – I don’t mean that they often do not have good intentions or knowledge, but since they are not under the direct or constant control of the state, no one knows what is going on.” on,” he adds.

“We create uncontrolled human dumps, where we dump what we don’t want to see,” says Stratos Georgoulas, professor of sociology at the University of the Aegean and head of the Laboratory for the Sociology of Youth, Leisure and Sports. K”, “the moment will come when the garbage will suffocate us.” The framework within which closed and open institutions function, he stresses, “according to these criteria and the production of profits” must cease to exist.

Research in the United Kingdom has shown that if children under the age of three spend 6 months in an institution, their brains remain irreversible.

According to Kevin Brown, professor of forensic psychology and child health at the University of Nottingham, who has done years of research on the subject not only abroad but also in Greece, children in institutions are three times more likely to experience sexual or physical abuse. than anything if they were in a biological, foster, or adoptive family, while he adds that institutional neglect of children under the age of five affects their brain development. “The quality of the institutions doesn’t matter—the fact that the structure exists without a one-on-one relationship between the child and caregiver causes brain damage,” he explains.

Research in the United Kingdom has shown that if children under the age of three spend 6 months in an institution, their brains remain irreversible. “My research has shown that the average time that children under the age of three spend in buildings in Greece is 15 months,” he tells K, emphasizing that Greece lags behind countries in both Western Europe and the Balkans. “In Montenegro, there are no children under the age of three in institutional care, in the United Kingdom, no child under the age of seven is outside the family environment, in Norway, no child under the age of ten,” he says.

He notes that boarding schools are also the most expensive form of welfare: the cost of a single mother is 1/6 of the cost of inpatient care. “We know that institutions are not the best place for children – if you take children who have already been abused or neglected and put them in institutions, it’s like taking them out of a frying pan and throwing them into a fire,” says Mr Brown. . The solution lies in the emotional and practical support of the biological families of these children with the possibility of placing them in foster or foster families, says Mr. Kolaitis.

UNICEF’s diplomatic representative in Greece, Luciano Calestini, told K that the organization’s office in our country has been working closely with the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs for the past three years to form an appropriate institutional and legislative framework to promote de-institutionalization and strengthen the underwriting institution. A necessary condition, he says, is a reform of the child protection system: “it must be well institutionalized, include all levels of services, with an emphasis on prevention and early intervention, and be based on family care, children from their biological environment, if this is assessed in their interests.”

But until then, adds Mr. Kolaitis, the existing institutional structures should function properly, with sufficient, quantitatively and qualitatively, staff. “People,” he emphasizes, “young or old, we need more than just shelter and food.”