Street child

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A street child or street kid is a child who lives on the street – in particular, one that is not taken care of by parents or other adults – and who sleeps on the street because he or she does not have a home. Estimates vary but one often-cited figure is that the number of children living independently in the streets totals between 100 million and 150 million worldwide.

Street children exist in many major cities, especially in the Third World, and may be the subject of abuse, neglect, exploitation, or even in extreme cases murder by "clean up squads" hired by local businesses.

Some reasons children have been driven out of their homes may be extreme poverty, severe family conflict, abuse and neglect, or parental abuse of alcohol and drugs.

In Latin America, a common cause is abandonment by poor families unable to feed all their children. In Africa, an increasingly common cause is AIDS.

In Russia, street children usually find a home in abandoned sewage systems during the harsh winter. These underground homes offer space, shelter and most importantly of all, heat.

The Council of Europe estimates that there are approximately 1000 street children in Bucharest, Romania, though estimates range from several hundred to 10,000. These children are homeless as a result of the policies of former Communist dictator Nicolae Ceauşescu, who forbade contraception in the hopes of ruling a populous nation, or of his successors, who consider the economy of greater importance than social welfare. Many of these children are abandoned or run away from home because their parents are too poor to feed them. Romania has the highest incidence of child HIV/AIDS cases in Europe, as a result of needless transfusions of contaminated blood in the 1986-1991 period, but HIV-positive street children do not have access to anti-retroviral therapy.


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