BAEH doing its best to cope during pandemic

THE demand for the services of the Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness is increasing, as more men and increasingly of late, more females are coming forward for assistance.

President of the Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness (BAEH), Kemar Saffrey, acknowledged the above in an interview with The Barbados Advocate this week, as he noted that the BAEH is doing the best that it can in the midst of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

“At the shelter, things are still busy for us. We are trying to fill the days that other feeders are not filling, so we are still doing a lot of meals; there is still the breakfast programme. We are still doing a lot of counselling. The group here started to go back on the road to see if we can find some homeless persons. So we are still doing everything we were doing before,” Saffrey noted.

“We are definitely adhering to the protocols. We still have people sleeping every night and that is increasing, especially amongst the women. Those numbers have been increasing on us, but we still have a job to do and we are doing it,” he stressed.

He added, “Since the COVID-19 pandemic, it has been very demanding and it has not been easy. We have been spending more to make sure that persons are safe, so we are doing a lot more with a lot less, but at the end of the day, we are still working assiduously to ensure that they get all the assistance that they need.”

As it relates to women in need, Saffrey pointed out that there have been cases where young women have gotten pregnant early and their relatives have become fed up taking on the burden of caring for their children, while they still wish to go out and live normal lives. There have also been family disputes which result in persons having to leave home, cases of persons not being able to find jobs and even the occasional issue of mental health, which comes into play.

For the men, Saffrey indicated that drug use is usually an issue for the younger males, along with some of the other factors affecting females as well.

He meanwhile raised a concern about the ill treatment meted out to some homeless persons, drawing reference to a video that recently went viral which saw an able-bodied male throwing a liquid from a bucket on a disabled homeless person lying beneath a building on a City street, while cursing at the homeless man, to get him to move from the spot.

Saffrey, who spoke out against such ill treatment which he said numerous persons called to his attention, noted that these are still some of the issues the BAEH has to advocate against.

In the meantime, persons wishing to make donations to aid the homeless or wishing to aid with the feeding programmes, can contact the BAEH directly to make arrangements to do so. (RSM)