AEGiS-11IAC: Uganda's 50 year experience in child adoption (1943 - 1993): implications for orphan care.

11th International AIDS Conference


Vancouver, British Columbia — July 7-12, 1996

Print this Article


Uganda's 50 year experience in child adoption (1943 - 1993): implications for orphan care.

Int Conf AIDS 1996 Jul 7-12; 11:450 (abstract no. Pub.B.1074)
Tuhaise CB; Uganda Foster Care and Adoption Association, Kampala, Uganda. Fax: +256 (041) 245580.

ISSUE: Traditional Orphan Care in Uganda through the child's next-of-kin is under strain partly due to HIV/AIDS. As more children fall from community to institutional care, non-traditional care options like fostering and adoption need exploration.Study: The Uganda Foster Care and Adoption Association ((UFCAA) recently completed an exploratory study of adoption applications at the Uganda High Court since adoption laws were introduced in 1943, to discover indigenous Ugandan involvement in this non-traditional social service. The study examined the magnitude and trend in applications, the socioeconomic background of applicants and children involved and the legal bottlenecks affecting child adoption.

RESULTS: Indigenous Ugandan applicants for adoption are still too few 50 years later; of the estimated 360 applications over the years, Ugandan applicants constitute about 30% the remaining being mainly British and Asian applicants in the 1950s and 60s. Yet the children are mainly Ugandan (41%) and since 1987 there is gradual increase in the number of applicants from Europe and North America wishing to adopt indigenous Ugandan children - only that until 1995 Uganda's laws were too out-dated and prohibitive.

LESSONS LEARNED: Unless more effort is put at promoting domestic child adoption many children will grow up without family and community care and increased institutional care may escalate inter-country adoption. Meanwhile, child care institutions need support especially to care for some of the children and infants who have HIV/AIDS.

Keywords: AEGIS, Foster Home Care, Adoption, Child Welfare, Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, Child Care, Family, Sjogren's Syndrome, Child Rearing, Time, Health Services Needs and Demand, Sezary Syndrome, Child Health Services, Uganda, North America, Europe, Child, Human, Infant, ICA11

960707
PubB1074

Copyright © 1996 - International AIDS Society (IAS). Reproduction of this abstract (other than one copy for personal reference) must be cleared through the IAS.