Save the Children regrets for its ‘misleading’ survey report

Save the Children, Bangladesh has expressed its regret for publishing a ‘misleading’ survey report conducted over a small sample of slum children here to find out COVID-19 impact on them, a foreign ministry statement said.

The acting head of Save the Children Bangladesh expressed his remorse and handed over a regret letter on behalf of his organisation to the foreign ministry officials here on Thursday as the ministry had inquired the global independent body for children about its recent faulty survey, a foreign ministry official said.

 “The so-called survey was conducted over only a sample size of 121 children through telephone conversation that doesn’t represent 6.5 crore of the country’s children and at all reflect the overall situation of the country,” read the foreign ministry’s statement issued last night, reports BSS.

The limited scale survey is misleading and failed to depict the actual situation of the country, it said adding that “The methodology of the survey was incorrect with faulty sampling framework”.

The statement said the survey reflected researcher’s lack of understanding over conducting a research work and at the same time it questioned the goodwill and credibility of Save the Children as an organisation.

According to Save the Children, the study reached over phone to 121 children, both girls and boys including children with disabilities, aged between 10-18, from different marginalised communities including urban slums, tea gardens and deprived rural areas of Bangladesh.

It said the findings show, among others, significant exposure of children to health risks despite reasonable information availability, drastic loss of income and livelihoods and severe food insecurity at the household level during the lockdown.