Psychosocial Support and Care Projects

Many projects for support for orphans and vulnerable children (OVC)have focused almost entirely on their physical needs. However, the needs of orphans and vulnerable children go beyond simply meeting their physical needs. Psychosocial support is an ongoing process of meeting physical, emotional, mental and spiritual needs of OVC, all of which are considered to be essential elements for meaningful and positive human development. Such projects have not provided the emotional support these children often need. Most of the managers of such projects lack information on the problems and are therefore unable to offer emotional support. Project managers do not know how to identify psychosocial and social problems and consequently fail to offer individual and group attention. This book discusses the provision of psychosocial support to OVC in a case of 90 orphans, 90 caregivers and 10 community leaders in Bumula division, Kenya. The urgent need to expand and improve current intervention programmes not only to meet the basic needs but also to include psychosocial support and counseling services for all stakeholders dealing with OVCs is also emphasized.