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Published on February 13, 2007 Children are supposed to be a nation's future. Among them we shall find our future leaders but with so many children under cover, so to speak, how do we know we are missing out on some possible talents? The United Nations Children's Fund says these children are so out of sight and out of mind that they've fallen off the developed world's radar. It says hundreds of millions of the poorest and most vulnerable children have quite become the forgotten and defenceless group and calls them "invisible children. According to the report on The State of the World's Children 2006, UNICEF has revealed an alarming state of children in Bangladesh. A large number are suffering from deadly ailments. There are also the disabled, ultra-poor, girl children, children suffering from HIV/AIDS and children of indigenous origin who are very hard to reach. Along with them, are children without any formal identity and when the UNICEF representative in Bangladesh says reaching these vulnerable children is a must if the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) are to be achieved, he is right, and if they continue to be excluded it is thought that 30 million children or so will have little chance for survival. One of the causes for their lack of visibility is that most are not registered at birth. UNICEF says worldwide, more than 50 million children are not registered and, as a result, are not counted in statistics or even recognized officially, a fact that leaves them without access to education and health care. One in 13 children in the developing world (143 million) has lost a parent and as Bangladesh has a staggering number of disabled children who are deprived of schooling, healthcare, and support services plus the five million children between the ages of 10 and 14, mostly girls, believed to be working as domestics, some without pay. UNICEF also estimates that 171 million children are forced to work in hazardous jobs with dangerous machinery, in factories, mines and agriculture. For Nigel Fisher, the president of UNICEF Canada, this is not acceptable. He said, "Children deserve to live in safety and with dignity and protecting children from harm is critical to their physical and emotional health, as well as their ability to develop to their fullest potential." But developing countries are not alone as the head of UNICEF Germany, Reinhard Schlagintweit says, "Despite the advancement of medicine, millions of children die as a result of poverty and underdevelopment. If these children had healthcare and access to clean water and sufficient food, their lives could be saved." A number of studies also show that poorer children suffer more than average from psychological and physical development disorders, as well as from headaches and abdominal pains. Furthermore, children from poorer families have a higher rate of accidents, as their coordination is underdeveloped as a result of poor nutrition and lack of exercise. UNICEF executive director Ann Veneman in a forward to the report said the state of the world's children are directly linked to whether the so-called millennium development goals set by world leaders include promoting gender equality and trying to improve maternal and child health by 2015. "Meeting the goal is, therefore, a matter of life or death - of progress or a step backward - for millions of children" in our case for the millions of working children, including the street children and child domestics. And what of our street children? Although the government has taken some initiatives to address their plight, this is obviously not enough therefore a suggestion for a 'one-stop crisis centre' to be opened in all public hospitals for taking street children under its wings are laudable. INCIDIN, the NGO that works closely with 'misplaced children' made the recommendation because, according to them, nearly 450 thousand such children around the country is victims of physical, sexual and mental abuse. Almost all of them are left with no assistance or help from anyone at all to eke out a living. But as all children have a right to be protected, we simply must find a way to reach them.
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