Lucy Liu visits Syrian refugee children in Lebanon settlement: ‘This is a children’s crisis and it’s only getting worse’
“Elementary” star and UNICEF ambassador, Lucy Liu, accompanied by UNICEF staff, visited makeshift settlements in the Bekaa region of Lebanon to see first-hand the dire situation for Syrian children and their families who have fled a crisis that has left more than 70,000 people dead and nearly six million displaced from their homes.
Lucy Liu
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“The camps I visited are severely underserved. We met families living in make-shift tents constructed of burlap sacks and plastic sheets. With no water or toilets, open trenches serve as latrines, and diarrhea cases are rising. Many children have scabies, lice and fleas,” said Lucy Liu, a UNICEF Ambassador since 2004. “I saw children playing in waste, in rubble. They are desperate to go to school.”
500,000 children are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance in Lebanon. Syrians fleeing their homeland to Lebanon amounts to 100,000 a month.
Children arriving from Syria have fled for their lives, often with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. More than 40 percent of children from Syria are of school age; many have missed months or even years of learning. In Lebanon, some 150,000 Syrian children are not in school, and that number is expected to rise to more than 400,000 by the end of the year. Public schools are coming close to reaching a saturation point.
“Every child deserves a childhood. These children need nutrition, medical care and education,” said Liu. “I am asking people to find out about this crisis and to please help them.”
In Lebanon, UNICEF is assisting refugees from Syria, as well as the poorest Lebanese host communities.
Syrian refugee children
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