Harry Potter Writer J.K. Rowling to Help Children
J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, introduced Thursday Lumos USA, a non-government organization (NGO) to help “eight million children living in orphanages and institutions around the world.”
The author went to America this week with the messages at the heart of Lumos’ work – that 80% of children in orphanages are not orphans but have been separated from their families due to poverty, disability, conflict and disasters; and that families are the best place for them to grow up.
Named after the light-giving spell in the Harry Potter books, Lumos is an international non-profit organization that helps countries reform their services for disadvantaged children, moving from systems based on residential institutions and orphanages that separate children from families to services which support them to stay together in the community.
[ RMN Foundation: Serving the Children ]
Lumos’ mission draws on decades of scientific evidence, including recently published work by Harvard University, showing that institutions have a negative impact on children’s physical, emotional and intellectual development by depriving them of the close, individual care and attention parents provide within a family.
J.K. Rowling is the author of the bestselling Harry Potter series of seven books, published between 1997 and 2007, which have sold over 450 million copies worldwide, are distributed in more than 200 territories, are translated into 78 languages, and have been turned into eight blockbuster films.
