Primary and secondary education in Macedonia has been mandatory since 2008, but the number of children, especially Roma, who do not attend classes shows that this provision of the Law on Education is not being implemented.

Unfortunately, there are no official statistics from the competent Ministry of Education on the number of children out of school, because it is dynamic and changing every day.

It should be noted that the families also received conditional cash benefits for each child involved in primary and secondary education through the MLSP, as additional stimulation and motivation. However, about 5-10% of Roma children are out of the educational process.

Systemic solutions are needed regarding the exclusion of Roma children from the education system. It is certain that there is no child who does not want to go to school, but do those children have the same starting position and opportunities as other non-Roma children.

The socio-economic status of Roma, who have been living in poverty for years, should be taken into account, as unemployment directly affects their children's support in education and their exclusion from the educational process.

The large Roma settlements in Macedonia are a potential time bomb for the mass spread of the "Kovid-19" virus. This is not because of the ethnicity of the Roma, their religion, culture or anything else, but because of the density of the overpopulation and the poor economic power of the people, which limits their options for prevention and health care.

The economic power of most Roma in Macedonia is so fragile that the question arises as to whether they can survive the economic crisis at all. In addition, living conditions make their settlements extremely risky areas for the virus to spread rapidly, and the lack of health insurance makes treatment difficult.

Most Roma work in an informal economy that does not work at all, and their stocks of money and products are really minimal.

Until recently, an additional problem was the low awareness of the Roma population about the dangers of this deadly virus. Many people in the Roma neighborhoods acted as if nothing was happening. When police finally returned and closed citizens' homes - as in all other parts of Skopje and Macedonia, it became clear overnight that most Roma were in such a fragile economic situation that they could not survive a week without a day job. informally linked to the informal economy.

Indeed, anyone who knows a little about the conditions in which most Roma live in Macedonia will agree that this is indeed the most vulnerable part of our population that must find a way to show its support. Otherwise, we could easily face mass pollution of entire settlements with tens of thousands of inhabitants. Or worse, hunger, social unrest and food shortages - which have not existed in Macedonia since the end of World War II.