MKA Joycare, formerly known as Shills Beauty, the official distributor for Against 24 personal hygiene products, kick-started the new year with a CSR campaign with a donation of RM60,000 worth of antibacterial body wash products to Shelter Home For Children.
Joyce Lee, Managing Director of MKA Joycare explained that personal care & hygiene is very basic but most essential in the on-going fight to overcome the coronavirus pandemic. The good habit of regular hand washing and bathing, and sanitization must come as second nature to all and should be inculcated from young.
“We are happy to do our bit to educate the Shelter Homes children on the importance of personal hygiene and share our antibacterial body wash products with them;” said Joyce.
The donation went to three Shelter Homes which houses approximately 10 – 15 children each between 4 – 12 years.
In most scenarios, 50% of these children in the homes are neglected cases while the balance 50% is between abuse and abandoned cases. The most pressing issue for these children is the healing of the trauma especially those abused cases and the healing process could take years at times even with professional counsellors attending to their mental and emotional needs.
Mr Chris, General Manager of Shelter Home said, “The ultimate aim of Shelter Home is to “heal” the child and ultimately reunite the child with the parents. We hope to provide some level of help to diffuse the “stressed out” families by offering to take the child out of a conflict situation into a better environment until the family resolves their marital or economic issues in cases where both parents are still around. Everyone can contribute to the betterment of a society by impacting the life of a child today,” said Chris.
Child abuse is on the rise in Malaysia with an increase of some 1,600 reported cases between 2005 and 2011. An average of 9 children in Malaysia were reported to be victims of child abuse each day in 2011. In general, 41% child victims experienced neglect, meaning a caretaker failed to provide for the child’s basic needs, 31% child victims were physically abused and 24% child victims were sexually abused, including incest.
Abuse is associated with short and long-term consequences that may include brain damage, developmental delays, learning disorders, problems forming relationships, aggressive behaviour, and depression. Survivors of child abuse and neglect may be at greater risk for problems later in life—such as low academic achievement, drug use, teen pregnancy, and criminal behaviour—that affect not just the child and family, but society also.
2 in 3 child victims reported in 2011 were abused by a family member. Perpetrators of child abuse and neglect are the very people responsible for the child’s safety and well-being (including parents, other relatives, and babysitters). The 2011 statistics from the Department of Social Welfare show that out of the 3,428 child abuse cases reported in Malaysia, some 1,500 were the biological mother or father of the child, while another 250 or so were the child’s adopted or stepparent.
