Photo: IRC
In Haiti, extreme poverty often forces parents to place their children in orphanages to be cared for and educated. But many children have been neglected, others exploited and abused, and some even trafficked or illegally put up for foreign adoption. Learn how the IRC is helping to bring families back together.
Visit any orphanage in Haiti and you’re likely to find that the overwhelming majority of children there are not, in fact, orphans.
Even before a massive earthquake devastated the island nation in January 2010, Haiti struggled with extreme poverty. Most Haitians had no jobs, and families unable to care for their children routinely placed them in orphanages.