ギリシアの小学校、中学校の児童の10%は食料不安(空腹)生徒
CECada vez más niños pasan hambre en Grecia
El 10% de los alumnos griegos de educación primaria y media padecen lo que los profesionales de la salud pública denominan “inseguridad alimentaria”
Liz Alderman (New York Times) Atenas 18 ABR 2013 - 13:44 T
CECada more children going hungry in Greece
10% of Greek students in primary and suffer half what public health professionals call "food insecurity"
Liz Alderman (New York Times) Athens 18 APR 2013 - 13:44 T
In her work as an elementary school principal, Leonidas Nikas is used to see the children playing, laughing and dreaming about the future. However, in recent times, has begun to see something completely different, something thought impossible in Greece: children who scavenge in dustbins from school to find something to put in their mouth needy children ask their peers their food scraps, and a boy of 11 years, Pantelis Petrakis, writhing with hunger happens.
"He had eaten almost nothing at home," Nikas said, sitting in his cluttered office of the college, which is located near the port of Piraeus in a working class neighborhood of Athens, while we hear children jump rope on the playground. Account speaking with parents saw Pantelis and shamed and humiliated, he confessed that took months looking for work without success. His savings had vanished and lived on pasta and ketchup.
"Never in my worst nightmares could have imagined it would come to a situation," said Nikas. "In Greece, children begin to come to school starving. There are families who not only have difficulty finding work, but to survive ".
The Greek economy is in free fall, after contracting by 20% in the last five years. Unemployment is above 27%, the highest rate in Europe, and six in 10 people seeking work say they have more than a year without working. These figures such harsh are transforming the lives of Greek families with children, more and more many children come to school hungry or poorly nourished, even malnourished, according to data provided by several private organizations and the government.
Last year, an estimated 10% of Greek students of primary and secondary education suffered what public health professionals call "food insecurity," meaning that they were hungry or at risk of passing it, says Dr. Athena Linos, professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Athens and Director of a food aid program Prolepsis, public health NGO who has studied the situation. "In terms of food insecurity, Grace has fallen to the level of some African countries," he says.
Greek schools do not have canteens subsidized. Students must bring their own food or buy it in the cafeteria. And that is a cost that has become unaffordable for families with little or no income. Their problems have been compounded further with new austerity measures demanded by creditors of Greece, such as higher taxes on electricity and cuts in subsidies to large families. As a result, parents who do not have jobs are seeing speeding away their savings and benefits.
"I keep hearing around me: 'My parents have no money. We do not know what we'll do, '"says Evangelia Karakaxa a vivacious 15 year old girl studying in the institute Acharnes number 9.
This city, working population located in the mountains of Attica, was a center of hustle and bustle, thanks to imports, until the economic crisis eliminated thousands of jobs.
Now, Evangelia says many of her classmates are hungry, and recently there was a guy passed out. Some children are beginning to tobar food, he adds. Although not apology, understand your situation. "Those who are well fed can never understand those who are not," he says.
"We have destroyed our dreams," he continues, his parents are unemployed but have a situation as bad as others. He pauses and continues quietly. "They say that when one is drowning, go spend your life in a flash before your eyes: I have the feeling that, in Greece, we are drowning on dry land."
Alexandra Perri, who works at the school, says that at least 60 of the 280 students are malnourished. Children who boasted before eating sweets and meat cooked macaroni speak now, lentils, rice or potatoes. "Cheaper" says Perri. This year, cases of malnutrition have increased. "A year ago we were not like that," says Perri while trying to hold back tears. "The frightening thing is how quickly the situation is deteriorating."
The government, which at first said that the information on this topic were exaggerated, has recently acknowledged that "address the problem of malnutrition in the schools." Now, because the return of the rescue is a priority, little money will stay in the Greek coffers to address this issue.
The school principal, Leonidas Nikas, is aware that the Greek government is working to fix the economy. Now that you do not talk that Greece will abandon the eurozone, the outside world has the impression that things are better. "But tell that to the family of Pantelis" he continues. "They do not see that their lives have improved."
On the floor of the family, close to school, Themelina Petrakis, having the lights out, I teach your fridge and cupboards. Inside is a small thing, apart from a few pots of ketchup and other condiments, some macaroni and scraps of food that have been in the council.
The family lived well and even helped others in need until last year. It had a spacious apartment, a plasma TV and a PlayStation.
But in December fired her husband, Michalis, 41, who worked for a transport company. Was five months without pay the salary. The couple stopped to pay the rent, and in February they ran out of money.
"When he called the head of school, I had to confess that we had no food," says Mrs. Petrakis, 36, Pantelis embracing fondly as he kept his eyes down.
Michalis Petrakis says the fact of not having found another job makes him feel less of a man. When food acabárseles started, stopped eating almost completely, and began to lose weight.
"Last summer, while working, even threw the bread that I had plenty," he says through tears. "Now I'm sitting here with a genuine war inside my head, trying to think how we will survive."
When hungry, Mrs. Petrakis proposes a solution. "It's simple," he says. "When I have hunger, I get dizzy, so I sleep until I get".
A report by UNICEF in 2012 showed that among the poorest families with children of Greece, over 26% had a "poor diet for economic reasons". The phenomenon has affected mostly immigrants, but it is spreading quickly among the Greeks who live in urban areas and who have one or both unemployed householders.
In rural areas, at least, people can grow their food. But that is not enough to eradicate the problem. An hour's drive northwest of Athens, in the industrial city of Asproprigos, Nicos Tsoufar, 42, has blankly as I talk to him at school attended by their three children. The center receives lunches prepared through a program organized by Prolepsis. Tsoufar says your kids need urgently those meals.
It takes three years without finding work. Now, he says, his family lives in what he calls "a diet cabbage", supplementing with snails found in the surrounding fields. "I know that cabbage is not enough to ensure nutrition," he says bitterly, "but there is no alternative."
The government and organizations like Prolepsis do what they can. Last year, the NGO launched a pilot program that offers a sandwich, fruit and milk in 34 public schools in which more than half of the participants said that 6,400 families had been "moderate to severe hunger."
With the program, that percentage dropped to 41%. Funded by a grant of eight million dollars granted by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, an international philanthropic organization, this year has been expanded to 20,000 children in 120 schools.
Greek Education Minister, Konstantinos Arvanitopoulos, says the government has received funding from the European Union to provide fruit and milk in schools and vouchers to eat bread and cheese. He is also collaborating with the Orthodox Church to distribute thousands of packages covering basic needs. "It's the least we can do in this difficult economic situation," he explains.
Leonidas Nikas, the school's director Pantelis, has decided to take care of things on its own center and is organizing food collection campaigns. I shocked to see that, in his view, Europe is not taking into account the problems of Greece.
"I'm not saying that we should just wait for others to help us," he says. "But if the European Union does not like this school, where everyone is helping each other because we are a big family, we have no future."
With information from Dimitris Bounias
Translation of Maria Luisa Rodriguez Tapia.
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