Natia's Story: Early Childhood Intervention in Georgia

Open Society Foundations

Natia’s Story is a personal profile story that illustrates a common theme when families are faced with potentially sick children and are not provided with adequate alternative support services. The piece maintains that Eastern Europe an Central Asia has the highest rates of institutionalized children in the world and that institutionalization often begins at birth.

In many cases, new mothers are often counselled to offer up their children to institutional care. Lacking community services, and facing discrimination from family, friends and medical professionals, mothers and families of sick children often feel they have little choice but to institutionalize their infants. Once institutionalized, mothers often face hardships in reclaiming their children from the institutions.

Early childhood intervention is cited as a way to prevent challenges like this from ever coalescing by providing parents with the skills and support they need. Natia was eventually provided support in order to take care of her child, and that support, more generally, is instrumental in providing the best opportunity for children to realize their rights under the Convention on the Rights of the Child to live with their parents and their right to care and support in the case of disability.