The Flame kids are all home but you would be aware that self isolating in their kind of environments would be near on impossible. Some of the families have gone back to their hometowns but many remain in Phnom Penh.

There are four main factors that Flame is considering:

Low immunity rates among malnourished communities

Flame clients are identified as being the poorest of the urban poor and usually are malnourished. Hunger in Cambodia is classified as a “serious” issue. This increases the susceptibility of our clients to contract the virus. Our staff are continuing to contact our clients by phone and only visiting when necessary.

Rate of mortality among the elderly and increases in domestic violence

The primary caregivers of 36 families in Flame are elderly. The risk for the children of these families is possibly highest in the longterm. We need to prepare for an influx of orphans. Increases in domestic violence with lockdown are common and we already have identified a number of families where domestic violence against both women and children is an issue. Our casework team are monitoring these families closely.

Daily wage earners are left with literally nothing

A great proportion of the families work on a daily wage basis with no savings whatsoever. There has been a huge reduction of city dwelling workers who buy from our sellers and closure of factories and industry has a huge impact on employees and the people one rung down who serve the employees. The scavenging (recycling) community appear to be currently continuing as usual, but I expect that there will be less rubbish on the streets as the urban population has dipped drastically with mass migration to rural areas. When families who have nothing are forced to diversify, it’s not a nice picture.

Increased Risk of Human Trafficking

In the wake of any natural disaster, the rates of human trafficking and exploitation statistically rise. We need to be prepared for this and especially in already at risk communities, the draw to a "new life” and bait of “employment” will be hard to resist. We will need to ramp up our monitoring of families who are particularly vulnerable and conduct some extra training about recognising and reporting human trafficking when we are able to meet again, but in the meantime, will try for an online platform on text platform to communicate the increased risk to our communities.

Re-opening

We are ramping up towards re-opening possibly earlier than other parts around the world as we have the “vaccine’ available already and very, very low rates of cases nationwide.

We will re-open and continue with our After-School Centres, Leadership Academy and Sports Programs as soon as is safe for both clients and staff.

a message from nicola

Please feel free to ask any questions. On behalf of the kids and families in Cambodia, I want to extend an extra thank you to you for making the work we do a possibly. You are making the world a better place.

Nicola and Team Flame
nicola@flamecambodia.org