This assignment focus on four major questions about the issue and tries to explain each one.
Abstract
It is known that child poverty is a big problem that the world is facing right now, and it seems like is growing rather than reducing. There are many organizations that throughout the time have been trying to stop this issue. In the United States this is a difficulty that is growing too due to the recession, and the government is also trying to implement new things to eliminate it. This literature review analyzes the physical and psychological consequences that poverty can cause in children. Moreover, it mentions the organizations that everyday fight to stop this problem. Also, it discusses what the government is doing to reduce poverty in the country.
Child poverty: A Review of the Literature
Poverty can be defined as the lack of money or material possessions, also is the incapability to satisfy the basic needs (food, clothes, shelter) due to the lack of resources. It is known that this state or condition do not discriminate according to the gender, age, race or religion; this problem can affect all ages groups, and one of the groups that is affecting the most are the children. Poverty is one of the principal issues that cause diseases, malnutrition, weak mental and physical development, and it some cases can cause dead. In addition, the government and the nonprofit organization for years and years make an extra effort to stop, or even reduce this issue. In order to understand more about this issue, the following questions need to be considered:
1. What kind of health impact does poverty have in children?
2. Does poverty can affect the social development of the children?
3. How are the government and the nonprofit organizations addressing poverty?
The following review on literature about child poverty will focus on these questions, in order to inform its readers about the physical and mental impact that poverty can cause in children, and what are the government and the nonprofit organizations doing to stop or reduce poverty.
What kind of health impact does poverty have in children?
The foundation of the health of a person develops in their first years of life, that is why the children should receive an excellent care, like to make sure that they are eating well, if they have their vaccines, and many other things to guaranteed that they are growing and developing well and that they will not have health problems in their adulthood, but the kids that experience poverty cannot have a balanced diet, and many other things because their lack of resources do not let them have it. According to Raphael (2011), “The experience of poverty during childhood is a potent predictor of a variety of adverse health outcomes during middle and late adulthood” (pp. 22-23). The children that live in poverty have a high mortality rate, because they experience more diseases due to the environment in which they develop.
Moreover, separately of causing hunger and thirst, poverty can cause illness due to the bad sanitation, because of the absence of cleanness is easy to spread or catch an infection, and because of the lack of food and water, people become more susceptible to the diseases. According to Hinojosa, an expert on the issue who has done a lot of research on the problem “Children that grow up in poverty, not only suffer malnutrition, but also they can suffer diabetes, cardiovascular problems, asthma, and many others; because of the environment in which they are developing, a cold can transform into a pneumonia, or even in a worst thing,” (J. Castillo, personal communication, October 15, 2011). Because a child is weaker than an adult, they can get sick very easily, but the children that are living in poverty can be more vulnerable, and can get sick faster than a child that does not have lack of resources.
According to Merlo (2011) “Individual health is not only individual responsibility, but also depends on the social contexts that condition the individual across the life course” (p. 109). That explains why the principal cause of diseases due to poverty in children is because when they were in the womb of their mothers, the women did not take care of themselves like they should, because of the lack of resources that they experienced, and this could turn out in a premature delivery, or even death. Because their parents cannot afford a proper nutrition for the child since he or she was a fetus, their immune system cannot completely form. If a woman that will have a baby does not eat well, or is constantly in a dangerous environment for the baby, this will bring a lot of bad consequences to the child. Poverty can be the source of diabetes, asthma, low birth weight, prematurity, growth stunting, and many others, but this issue not only cause physical problems, it can cause learning disabilities, developmental delay, and many other psychological problems.
Does poverty can affect the social development of children?
Although the physical problems that poverty can cause are very severe, the mental impact that this issue can transmit in children is very damaging for their development too. As Aber, Bennett, Conley, and Li stated, “Poverty has indirect effects on child development through causal mechanisms such as stress, parenting behavior, and family processes such as divorce/ separation” (pp. 475-476). Not only children have to deal with their health, but also they have to focus with their family issues too, and that will make them to develop with several problems and traumas, which they will carry in all of their lifetime.
Also, because of the economic limitations that the parents have, they are not able to supply with toys, books, an adequate day care, preschool, or other things that are basic for the children development (Aber, Bennett, Conley, and Li. 1997, p. 475). A toy can really make a child happy, and also it can make them to grown in a cheerful environment. Right now a toy is not a luxury anymore, is a way that a child can express different things and play, and sometimes a toy is necessary to mature in different ways. Likewise, a book can inspire the imagination of a child, and the imagination is also a tool that the kids should have in their childhood. Similarly, by being in an adequate day care children can start learning some things before middle school. All of these things can create a person with aspiration and imagination that will stay with the children in all of their life.
As stated by Özkan (2010), “It is known that children living in poverty experience higher levels of depression and distress than more economically affluent children due to the lack of things which facilitate their interpersonal acceptances” (p. 172). The entire things stated before in this literature review can make the child to incline into unhappiness or hopelessness, because of their lack of resources they tend to compare to other children that are not experiencing their situation, and they feel bad about that. Also they feel pressure, because sometimes they do not want to accept the situation, and that pressure can turn into depression.
Castillo said that because of the health problems that the children experience they sometimes would have to miss classes, then they would probably have to repeat a course, and finally the situation will create some kind of limits to the child, because he or she will think that he cannot do certain things (J. Castillo, personal communication, October 15, 2011). The health problems that the children experience due to the lack of resources will turn in a psychological problem that can affect them in all of their days. But fortunately for them, there are many nonprofit organizations that try to reduce child poverty, and also the government is trying to end with it.
How are the government and the nonprofit organizations addressing poverty?
About 21,000 children die every day because of malnutrition, unsafe drinking water, or due to the lack of an affordable vaccine (UNICEF, 2011). And all of these causes can resume only in one; poverty, but there are a lot of organizations, like UNICEF, that are trying to reduce this issue, in order to save more children from this condition. Not only the nonprofit organizations are trying to stop this problem, but also the government of the country is very concerned about poverty too, and by trying to help families they have various programs that can be very useful for the families that are facing this situation. The government and the nonprofit associations are trying to address poverty in different ways, but with only the objective to help the families that live in poverty.
Even that the United States is one of the world’s richest nation, some people is still facing poverty, and because of the recession the number of children that are experiencing this is growing. The U.S. Census Bureau tries to show how the rate of the children in the country that live in poverty is growing by considerable numbers year to year by showing a graph that collects the data since 1997 to 2008.
Figure 1:
According to the graph the United States is facing the highest rate of child poverty that has been presented in ten years, and just in one year the rate went up by 1 percent, and if the numbers keep going up year to year in 2020 the rate will be extremely higher and maybe unstoppable, that is why the organization and the government are trying to implements programs that can help the children and their families.
The principal program that the government uses to address poverty is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), most commonly known as the Food Stamps Program. According to the Department of Agriculture, this program is a nutrition assistance program that helps low-income families and individuals purchase nutritious and healthy food (2011). The program consists in giving certain amount of money in a card to the families that need it, and they only can exchange that money for food in certain stores. The government determines the money that will be given to the family by their income, and by the family members that are children and elderly. For many years this program has been working in the country, because it provides the necessary money to help people to not suffer malnutrition, which is one of the principal difficulties that poverty can cause.
There are many nonprofit organizations around the world that try to address poverty day by day, one of the best know is UNICEF that provides child immunizations and vaccinations, clean water and sanitation, prevent malnutrition, and provides access to a quality education for all children (UNICEF, 2011). This organization works around in 150 countries and is sustained by the voluntary donations that people do, monthly, annually, or only once. UNICEF also looks for people that want to do volunteer work, and that intend to be a part of the global child survival movement. Almost all of this kind of organizations work the same way, by donations and by voluntary work, like Tearfund, Care, World Vision, Zero Poverty Now, Bread, and many others.
Conclusion
In conclusion child poverty has been a problem for many years, and according to the data that has been shown, it seems like it would be a problem for more years. It can affect in many ways the health of the children by causing asthma, diabetes, malnutrition, prematurity, or even this can cause death. Moreover, poverty affects the social development of the children by causing depression for not having certain things like the others, or it can cause stress due to the limitations that this kids experience in their lifetime. Although this people can find help in the government or in the nonprofit organizations, it seems like it is not enough. Despite of the effort that the government and the nonprofit organization are doing, poverty is still one of the principal issues in the society. As Martin Luther stated, “It is a tragic mix-up when the United States spends $500,000 for every enemy soldier killed, and only $53 annually on the victims of poverty.” It could seem like it is not so important but for the people that are suffering it, can be like war by fighting day by day to survive.
References
Aber, L., Bennet, N., Conley, D., & Li, J. (1997). The effects of poverty on child health and development. Annual Reviews, 463-483. Retrieved from http:// www.annurev.org
Census Bureau (2009). Child poverty rate reaches highest since 1997 [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/
Census, Bureau (2011, Aug 01). Poverty. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/
Raphael, D. (2011). Poverty in childhood and adverse health outcomes in adulthood. Maturitas, 69(1), 22-26. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com/
Merlo, J. (2011). Contextual Influences on the Individual Life Course: Building a Research Framework for Social Epidemiology. Psychosocial Intervention / Intervención Psicosocial, 20(2), 109-118. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.
Oberg, C. (2003). The impact of childhood poverty on health and development. Healthy Generations, 4(1), 1-6. Retrieved from http://www.epi.umn.edu
Özkan, Y. (2010). Interpersonal Impact of the Poverty on Children. International Journal of Academic Research, 2(6), 172-179. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.
UNICEF. (2011). Unicef's work. Retrieved from http://www.unicefusa.org
U.S. Department of Agriculture. (2011, Oct 17). Supplemental nutrition assistance program (snap). Retrieved from http://www.fns.usda.gov
