January 12, 2011

Remembering Haiti – Why Adoption Isn’t Always the Solution

January 12th 2011 Posted to Current Events,International Adoption

On the anniversary of the massive earthquake in Haiti, this report from the organization Save the Children is especially timely. It is a clear, experience-based report on why adopting children and funding orphanages is not the best way to help children in crisis situations like the Haiti earthquake. Here are a few of the reasons:

  • Hasty adoptions increase the very real risk that children who still have living family members nearby will be adopted abroad. It is often difficult or impossible for their families to get them back.

  • Research shows that children who have suffered trauma do best with familiar people and surroundings. If it is possible to safely keep the child among people he knows and trusts, who speak his own language, in familiar surroundings, that is generally best for the child.

  • Placing too heavy an emphasis on funding orphanages gets fewer resources to children who are not orphans but who are still in crisis. Often, families in crisis bring their children to orphanages even when they have living relatives to care for them, simply because the orphanages have the resources. In Indonesia, for example, many of the children in orphanages were placed there by their families so that they could get an education.

  • The report also suggests that some orphanages actively block efforts to reunite non-orphaned children with their families because they have to have a certain quota of children in order to keep their funding.

    • The report concludes that a better way to protect children is to get funds to children who are being cared for within families as well as those in institutional care, and to put a hold on adoptions until serious efforts can be made to reunite children with their families.Wanting to “rescue” children in crisis situations is a noble feeling, but it’s essential that we make sure we are really doing what’s best for them. I applaud Save the Children for this important work.

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