31/08/2007 - SOS Children's Villages will provide affected families with temporary shelters and counselling after devastating wildfires have raged across Greece.
SOS Children's Villages Greece will provide relief to families from Hleia, Arkadia, Messinia and Evoia. Up to 30 families who have lost their homes and all their belongings will be temporarily sheltered at the two Greek SOS Children's Villages. They will also receive counselling if needed.
Additionally, a relief team comprising social workers, psychologists and child educators is being organised to be deployed in the areas affected. SOS Children's Villages Greece is still waiting for the Ministry of Health's confirmation to go ahead with relief activities.
Sterios Sifnios has only one word to describe the situation in those areas where wildfires have been ravaging for days: "Disastrous. This is something you can barely describe - burnt down houses and woods as far as your eyes can see. More than 4,000 homes have been devastated; more than 30,000 people depend on emergency relief, particularly shelter, water, financial help and counselling."
"An 80-year-old lady told me: 'We are old, we have no future to our lives. But, please, help our young ones!" Sterios Sifnios reports.
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One of the Greek SOS Children's Villages is located in Vari, south of Athens, the other in Plagiari east of Thessaloniki. Another project in the country's north-east is still in the planning stage. Further, there is a social centre in Athens with a focus on school-oriented psychotherapy for children and young people and which is also providing support to parents in all areas of life.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
