AROUND three-quarters of Slovaks have never thought about adopting a child, or simply do not want to adopt one. Of those who admitted having considered doing so, most would not want to adopt a Roma baby.
According to a recent survey carried out by the MVK agency on 1,200 respondents, 18 percent of those questioned could imagine adopting a child, but only 3.1 percent would be willing to adopt a Roma child.
Marek Roháček, who leads the Návrat (Return) NGO, says that Slovakia lags behind other countries when it comes to charity. "In Norway, which is similar to Slovakia in terms of population, there are around 7,000 adopted children, whereas in Slovakia the number is only about 3,000."
At the moment, there are around 4,000 children living in orphanages in Slovakia, most of them Roma. Roháček said that the survey shows that Slovaks are intolerant. "Not every family is able to deal with criticism from the outside. They'd rather adopt a child from Africa than a Roma one," he told the Sme daily.
Not a single manager and only 3 percent of entrepreneurs said they would consider adopting a Roma child. The most willing to do so were families with the lowest net incomes of up to Sk5,000 (€140.9) per month.
In addition, the survey also showed that atheists took a more positive view of adoption than religious people.
