Disaster Response Turkey Project #33070

Support Syrian Refugee Mothers in Turkey

by Support to Life (STL) Hayata Destek Dernegi

Project Report | May 13, 2019
Access to Healthcare is Crucial

By Fatih Kyman | Editor

“I and my husband Muhammed recently had a boy, Muhammed Ali. He is 9 months old now. He’s been diagnosed with down syndrome recently, Support to Life helped us navigate the whole process with the hospital – my son’s registration has been a problem right from the beginning, it’s a huge problem when you are trying to get medical attention.”

Mohammed (33) and Tulin (23) met in Istanbul and got married here. Tulin, however, did not have a ‘Temporary protection ID’ because since a while back, it is not possible for recently-arrived Syrian refugees to register in Istanbul – it is part of the Turkish government’s policy to curb Syrian influx to Istanbul from smaller cities. Thus, their marriage was never formalized with public authorities. This inevitably created an obstacle when Tulin gave birth to Muhammed Ali.

While Syrians registered under ‘temporary protection’ status are able to access basic services like healthcare, it is often that disorderly patterns of migration give rise to difficulties when registering and refugees are left without any protective status. In Tulin and Mohammed’s case, this led to greater difficulties as Muhammed Ali got diagnosed with jaundice when only one week old: “We went to Muhammed Ali’s first check-up when he was one week old. My boy was diagnosed with jaundice. The doctor told us that his condition was critical. However, we had no money. We got a transfer to the state hospital. Muhammed Ali stayed in the incubator for 9 days and finally he was fine. But we still had to pay to the hospital. When I couldn’t pay, they took me to the manager and he told me that what we did here constituted a crime. My 10-day old child had jaundice, how can this be a crime?”

This is when Support to Life (STL) stepped in; liaising with local authorities to first register the newborn on his father’s ID so that he could receive medical attention. As a result of these efforts, the family was able register their child under the father’s name, and get his ‘temporary protection ID’ issued. Although things got easier from then on, STL followed up with Tulin’s case because even Syrians with the temporary protection status have issues accessing healthcare. The language barrier often makes it difficult for them to discuss symptoms or treatment with medical professionals at the hospitals. STL provided translation support to Tulin’s family and during Muhammed Ali’s regular check-ups, he was diagnosed with down syndrome. Although such news are hard to take in, at least timely diagnosis was made possible with bureaucratic and practical assistance provided.

As STL, we’ll keep on offering our support to Muhammed Ali to ensure that his family have to means to raise him a healthy individual. It is time and again proven that children with down syndrome can grow up to be highly functional and self-reliant. We hope to do everything within our power to make sure that Muhammed Ali’s case is no different.

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Feb 11, 2019
Advocacy and Awareness Raising is Crucial

By Fatih Kyman | Communication Expert

When working to help refugee mothers and the children they raise in Turkey, how do we engage in advocacy and awareness-raising to maximize our positive impact? This is the question we’d like to answer in this quarterly report.

As the Syrian war reaches its 8^th year, we acknowledge that it is more important than ever to emphasize one aspect of the Syrian refugee response – no lost generation! This is a sentiment we support along with many other humanitarian organizations and service providers in the field, mostly in the context of school-aged children that have difficulties accessing education services.

8 years is a long time. Consider this; a child who was 5 when their parents crossed the border is now 13. That’s high school age.

It is often that we encounter children who, for one reason or the other, are unable to continue or even start school in Turkey. Sometimes this is due to the language barrier. Sometimes the reasons have to do with registration processes (which may get easily complicated when families are changing cities or even neighborhoods). Or sometimes the child is forced to support their family in ways that dissociate them from school (i.e. helping with domestic chores or even working in the informal economy).

We have an obligation not only to identify and respond to these challenges, but also make them known to public authorities and other service providers so that coordinated and complementary action can be taken. This is how we engage in ‘humanitarian diplomacy’ - the type of advocacy work through which we ‘lobby with data’. Thanks to the coordinated effort with relevant stakeholders and authorities on local and national levels, we’ve time and again been able to lift procedural or bureaucratic barriers that stand in the way of refugees’ access to basic needs and services – including those of newborn children.

In addition to advocacy work, awareness-raising among refugee communities is another crucial domain to make sure that there is no lost generation. When families are most vulnerable, they sometimes resort to what we call ‘negative coping strategies’ such as child labor or early marriages. To prevent or resolve these coping strategies, we hold information sessions that are provided both by our field teams and by the volunteer community members themselves. Typically, these information sessions fall under two categories. Firstly, we inform families of existing of their rights, duties as well as the social services made available to them. Secondly, we inform them of the long-term negative effects of the seemingly negligible decisions such as sending children to work.

Last by not the least, we’d like to finish off with the type of information material we provide to the refugee mothers that give birth in Turkey; our ‘Mother Diary’ which includes useful information about a newborn’s development. If you wish to take a look, you can access the English version in the attachment.

With your support, we’ll keep on addressing the basic needs of vulnerable communities like the Syrian refugees, and improving their resilience by carrying relevant information to relevant parties at the right time.

Attachments:

Mother Diary (PDF)

2 Attachments

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Nov 15, 2018
Support to Life Believes in Integrated Support

By Fatih Kyman | Communication and Fundraising Expert

Support to Life continues to provide 10th month packs to refugee mother that are about to give birth or has given birth recently. While Support to Life’s field teams and its outreach campaigns are instrumental reaching out and becoming known to those in need, Support to Life Hubs are also open to consultation by those who need our support.

We would like to begin our report with a piece of exciting news: Thanks to the humanitarians worldwide and our donor institutions, our team is now 300 large and our protection activities are once again geared up for evidence-driven, sustainable, integrated support!

Speaking of which, let us use this opportunity to explain how we provide integrated support to those that receive our 10^th month care packs – after all, a 10^th month pack is simply one link for a child’s healthy development.

When we identify a refugee mother who has given birth, we conduct a needs assessment that looks not only into basic demographic data such as the household’s income, number of children, senior members; but also predicts a food consumption index through questionnaires. Furthermore, if there are other children at school age, we make sure to provide assistance in getting them enrolled to schools. Unfortunately, child labor is what we call ‘a negative coping strategy’ – it helps the family secure a livelihood while depriving a child of its right to a healthy development.

That said, our integrated support does not end there. We invite family members to information sessions that we regularly hold in our community centers. Topics range from childcare, hazards of child labor, gender-based violence, and similar. Our aim is to make sure that all family members are well quipped to join hands and raise a healthy individual.

Each time we hand over a 10^th month pack to someone in need, we also have an invaluable opportunity to deliver integrated support. Thanks to your support, we do not need to worry about the additional costs that are associated, and we can focus on the family’s utmost benefit.

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