She knew her 13-year-old daughter was being bullied at school and had met with administrators begging them to intervene, but she never expected that it would lead to her watching helplessly as 57 pills were pumped from the stomach of her only child...
With bullying becoming pervasive and seemingly normalised in Jamaica, the Child Development Agency (CDA) decided in 2015 to conduct a study looking at the issue.The study, which investigated the prevalence and impact of peer abuse (bullying) on the...
Beating a child (corporal punishment) is considered a necessity by some Jamaican parents, but immigration attorney Joan Pinnock is warning that Jamaicans migrating to the United States will have to learn how to spare the rod, as this is one of the...
CEO of the Jamaica National Agency for Accreditation (JANAAC), Sharonmae Shirley, is expressing concern about the number of medical laboratories operating across the island without being accredited.But the Ministry of Health is displaying no such...
After four years of motivating children across Jamaica, robotic superhero Captain I CAN says he is now hard-pressed to continue his mission of spreading positive messages because of his inability to find the money.Captain I CAN is an eight-foot,...
New head of the Centre for Investigation of Sexual Offences and Child Abuse (CISOCA) Superintendent Charmine Shand is warning paedophiles across the island that she is coming for them.More than half the almost 600 cases reported to the (CISOCA)...
With several early-childhood institutions (ECIs) still unable to meet all the guidelines to be certified, Jamaicans are being urged to choose wisely when registering their young children for the new school year.Only 61 of the country's more than 2,...
With the planned merger of the Child Development Agency (CDA) and the Office of the Children's Registry (OCR) slated to be implemented by October, two of Jamaica's leading voices for children's rights remain concerned about the possible implications...
Unlike the animals he tends to at the Hope Zoo in Mona, St Andrew, 14-year-old Kkristoffe Campbell doesn't want to spend any time being locked up.The Kingston College student is one of several youth deemed "at-risk" now benefiting from a Boys of...
There are concerns that many young Jamaicans are being forced to live precariously and are demotivated in the workplace because of their inability to secure permanent employment.This is one of several issues the Jamaica Civil Society Coalition (JCSC...
While it is still uncertain how 11-year-old wheelchair user Sarai Watson will navigate her new school come September, the young scholar's tuition is one thing her family will not have to worry about.Sarai has been placed at the Immaculate Conception...
Administrators of the Salvation Army School for the Blind and Visually Impaired are pushing to raise $15 million this year to refurbish the school's library which was built in 1970."Our library is not up to the 21st century so that we (are not) able...
At 12 years old, Orlando* started smoking ganja because a man in his community told him the ink from the book leaf he often lighted up would cause him to go crazy."One of the big man dem see me and said, 'you mustn't smoke paper bredda, if you are...
She is not a dentist, but senior Parish Court judge Paula Blake-Powell has likened the process of reforming children with substance-abuse problems to pulling teeth.The Kingston and St Andrew Family Court, where Blake-Powell presides, embarked on an...
More than 70,000 children in Jamaica were reported abused between 2007 and 2015 and the rights of hundreds more have been violated since then, but the Office of the Children's Advocate (OCA) has been hard-pressed to investigate many of these cases....
For the second consecutive year, the Early Stimulation Programme (ESP) for children with disabilities is seeing a doubling of its enrolment figures, but the programme's director, Antonica Gunter-Gayle, doesn't mind this trend.According to Gunter-...
Medical practitioner and president of the Rotary Club of New Kingston, Dr William Aiken, has joined those expressing concern about how some pregnant women are treated at public health facilities.With several horror stories from mothers over the year...
A shortage of interpreters for the local deaf community is threatening to derail efforts to meet the communication needs of these Jamaicans and has forced those needing this service to look overseas.Executive director for the Jamaica Association for...
Executive director of the Combined Disabilities Association, Gloria Goffe, remains concerned over the level of discrimination meted out to members of the community who chose to start a family.According to Goffe, while many persons no longer openly...
The Ministry of Health is spending more than $727 million each year to provide security at the island's public health facilities, but with several reports of verbal and physical attacks on health workers in recent times, Health Minister Dr...
After two previous attempts, the draft National Plan of Action for an Integrated Response to Children and Violence (NPACV) was unveiled yesterday, with a pledge for the final document to be produced within the next six months.Minister of State in...
The production of too little milk is one of the excuses that many Jamaican mothers give to breastfeeding specialist Pauline Lovindeer, as they try to explain why they do not give their babies breast milk exclusively in the early weeks after birth."...
Concerned that his colleagues are overly stressed from working in a 'war zone' on a regular basis, senior medical official, Dr Orville Morgan, is calling for the rotation of doctors who have to deal with trauma to reduce the likelihood of them...
More than $250 million was spent to redirect patients from the accident and emergency rooms at public hospitals to health centres across the island last year, but Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton admits that people continue to show up at...
Struggling to deal with the sharp increase in trauma patients which has stretched its capacity to almost breaking point in recent days, the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH) is also facing the continuing problem of persons who rush to its Accident and...
