Child day-care centres

About two weeks ago, Guyanese woke up, opened their news sources, and saw the horrible headline. 7 months old Oriya Gravesande had died after falling from a bed and suffocating in a sheet at a day-care centre at Ogle. Many Guyanese were overcome by emotions upon learning of the tragedy. The question is, what’s next?

While many of us grieve with a family we do not personally know, people in positions of authority should be doing some deep soul searching; how can such a horrible thing happen, and what can be done to spare another family such unspeakable grief?

Guyana has legislation, regulations, and guidelines that govern the operations of child day-care centres. The principal law is the Guyana Child Care Act number 12 of 2011. Other pieces of legislation also relate to the issue.

In July, 2016, the Early Child Development Unit collaborated with the Child Protection Agency (CPA), and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)  to launch childcare services regulations.

Among the various laws and regulations, there are requirements and provisions that are supposed to protect children at daycare centres. We must ask ourselves, though, are those provisions sufficient? Are they being enforced? We must find out, what went wrong in this case? Why did little Oriya die?

The statutes and regulations mandate inspections of such facilities, and particular criteria must be met by those who work at such places. While none of those things can possibly now matter to the family of the deceased infant, authorities need to revisit and review the entire system of safeguards because something certainly went wrong, and a family – if not almost a whole country – mourns.

There are more than 300 child day-care centres in Guyana. Those facilities are necessary because of the realities of life – parents have to go to work to put food on the table, and someone has to take care of children while parents work. Considering the numbers involved, this is a major area of concern.

According to international experts, such facilities can be very dangerous places. This is so, experts say, because of a confluence of factors including staff training, and the natural inclination of small children to encounter hazardous situations.

The hazards are too many to list, but they include: falls, falling objects, choking, old playground equipment, inadequate supervision, poorly trained staff, neglect, and the list goes on.

Experts say that in many cases, children at such facilities do not get the required standard of care. Experts cite issues such as:

Failure to change soiled diapers or clothing.

Failure to help children go to the bathroom.

Failure to provide proper nutrition.

Failure to ensure children receive enough liquids or water.

Failure to seek medical treatment when an injury occurs.

And, again, the list goes on.

While it is iterated that none of this matters to little Oriya’s grieving family right now, this publication expects that those who have responsibility for such matters take note. Guyanese, one would believe, expect that the government would heed this wake-up call.

As the Guyana Police Force continues to investigate this specific tragedy, this publication calls on all relevant agencies to take action; a comprehensive, thorough, holistic, and complete review must be undertaken. Nothing resembling this horrible event must ever happen again.