The project
involves 15 fact-finding missions to the social care institutions in Serbia accommodating
individuals with long-term care needs: adults and children with various forms of mental
disabilities, children without parental care and/or with social behavior disorders,
disabled persons and old people/geriatric patients. These investigating missions are
planned as civil sector advocacy both against institutional bias and noncompliance with
internationally recognized standards for institutionalization. This 18-month project,
realized in three phases, results in well-argued, comparative reports with detailed
guidelines for domestic authorities and relevant institutions, which will also be brought
before the public eye at three press conferences.
With the assistance of the network of civil sector organizations
concerned with specific vulnerable groups of population and in tandem with the Mental
Disability Rights International /MDRI/ the Helsinki Committee will undertake both domestic
and international advocacy for policy change in the sector of social care institutions,
which would, among other things, enable the provision of more home and community-based
services for people with mental and physical disabilities, children/young adults without
parental care and/or with behavior disorders, and the old.
The program is realized with the assistance of the Open Society
Institute.
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