The Effect of the Refugee Crisis on Children

Refugee statistics from The UN Refugees Agency (UNHCR) shows that there are 65.8 million refugees around the world. Those that have to leave their own country also bare with the issues of 28 million child refugees.

The situation in temporary camps is dirty. Most of those living in these environments are facing wicked conditions. There isn’t enough food and there is a lacking in educational resources including schools, books and teachers. They cannot live their childhood with the privilege that many of us have.

In some cases, children don’t even live in the camps they are intended to stay in. They try to live in cities working heavy jobs, like manual labour, or begging on the street instead of going to school. Children are the most effected group by ongoing wars in a whole host of countries around the world.

Turkey is hosting 3 million refugees and most of them comprise of children. There are 1.6 million refugee children in the Eurasian country. As a result of the civil war in Syria, many fled their homes in order to find a safer place to stay and live.

We have to prevent these 1.6 million Syrian children becoming a part of the ‘missing generation’. I think that we have only one way and that way is education.

In Turkey, all are welcome to go to school and those children have the same rights as other Turkish children.

Shortages in resources are bound to effect the way we tackle the situation so I ask, what should we do with all these refugee children?

Perhaps, sending volunteers around the world will help education these poor souls trying to just live their lives like any normal people.

Finally, if we don’t protect children’s rights and if we don’t save their lives, we’ll see more children swim at sea, like the tragic case of Alan Kurdi.

Photo by Fancycrave on Unsplash