The road that has led us to adopt has been long. From the time the Lord first sparked the idea in my mind almost two years ago, or even further still to the time when I was a baby myself being adopted. God always had this planned for our family, we just didn't know it for sure until recently. We are very fortunate to be part of a church and a community that is pretty adoption "literate". In fact, the Lord has used many people in our lives to encourage us and answer the million questions that seem to pop up almost daily. Like I said, He always knew we were going to do this so he put us in a place where we would have some help navigating this journey. But, for those of you who are not as familiar with adoption, orphans, Africa, Ethiopia, etc., well this page is for you.
*Life expectancy in Ethiopia 39 years for males and 42 years for females. The leading cause of death is communicable diseases such as malaria, typhoid, meningitis, cholera, AIDS, tuberculosis, yellow fever.
* One in ten children die before their first birthday
* One in six children die before their fifth birthday
* Woman have an average of 7 children and the maternal mortality rate is 1 in 14
* Ethiopia's neonatal mortality rate is one of the highest in the world - 49/1000 births with tetanus infection being the second major cause of infant/neonatal death.
* Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world. Over half the population lives on less than a $1 a day. The average income in Ethiopia is US$100 a year. Almost 82% of the population lives on less than $1 a day.
* Malnutrition levels are among the highest in the world.
* Ethiopia is home to 4-6 million orphans, or 12% of all children.
* That is the same number of children under age 18 who reside in Massachusetts, New York State, and Washington DC combined. If every parent in those places died tonight - that would be similar to Ethiopia's orphan crisis.
* More than half a million of these were orphaned as a result of AIDS.
* Only 42.7% age 15 and over can read and write.
* Only 18 percent of children reach grade five. That means 82% of children don't.
*44% of the population is under 15 years old
*60% of children in Ethiopia are stunted because of malnutrition
