Social Work & Society ▪▪▪ A. Fili, V. Xythali: The Continuum of Neglect: Unaccompanied Minors in Greece disruption and fragmented services. Moreover, funding to NGO in Greece is normally offered for assistance to asylum seekers. As a result, access to most facilities is impeded for recognized refugees or non-asylum seekers, linking the right to housing with the right to asylum; thus, putting extra pressure on children to enter the asylum procedure, even when they wish to travel onwards. Caring for the most vulnerable of the vulnerable For a number of years, migration policies and practices migrant sidelined women and girls due to their small numbers. Until the second half of 2016, there was only one accommodation facility especially designed to house unaccompanied girls. Despite the fact that they still represent a small portion of the UAM population, partly reflecting concerns over the growing numbers of UAM and partly due to recent reports by human rights organizations that 24 highlight their gender-specific needs , there has been considerable attention to their vulnerability and the dangers they face. Mainly due to overcrowding there are no separate facilities for unaccompanied girls within RIC, rendering them exposed to gender based violence (GBV). The same issue applies to refugee camps, where women of all ages report feeling unsafe to walk around and use 25 facilities, especially at night . The lack of female interpreters further hinders girls’ access to reproductive health care and contraception, while identifying and assisting survivors and potential victims of trafficking seems challenging in the absence of adequately trained staff. To avoid mixed accommodation, two new special accommodation facilities have been established to cater for young girls’ needs. Still, the lack of a protective environment both in closed and open facilities leaves them exposed to trafficking and exploitation networks, more apparent in children’s repeated attempts to reach another European country irregularly. Residential care facilities have no capacity to care for disabled UAM or UAM with special needs and mobility issues, while some of the buildings are not even wheelchair-accessible. Disabled UAM are either entirely neglected or their care is left to the discretion and the good will of the – untrained and inexperienced – staff. On other occasions, disabled children are forcibly hospitalized. With regard to mental health issues, UAM have access to the Greek public healthcare system that lacks both the specialization and cultural awareness to assist and treat them. At the same time, there are rarely available interpreters to assist with the therapeutic process. There is only one NGO in Athens, Babel, where UAM can receive intercultural and appropriate to their age psychological and psychiatric care. Feelings of stress and anxiety, as well as depressive behaviors are common among UAM of all ages. Feelings of idleness can also be attributed to the dearth of available activities and lack of vocational training in accommodation facilities. We lack enough available data on the dimension of the problem, but we have come across a number of cases where feelings of isolation for the UAM who struggle to communicate their needs, expectations and hopes, as well as access to valuable information, have led to suicide attempts. Against this context, it comes as no surprise that, until very recently, 20% of UAM disappeared from accommodation facilities within 24 hours of their placement, while the 24 https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/05/19/greece-refugee-hotspots-unsafe-unsanitary https://www.newsdeeply.com/refugees/community/2016/06/06/refugee-women-on-greek-islands-in-constantfear 25 Social Work & Society, Volume 15, Issue 2, 2017 ISSN 1613-8953 ▪▪▪ http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:hbz:464-sws-1264 10