Comments on: Haitian Orphans (again)

By: waiting4kiera

waiting4kiera — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 20:13:24 +0000

Since RQ lifted the rule about naming agencies for this post, this is an email I received from America World Adoption Agency:

I am writing to update those who are interested in Haitian adoption. I participated in a conference today involving USCIS, US Dept. of State and the Dept. of Health and Human Services. At this time, the only children being processed for visas are those children who either had their adoption finalized within Haiti prior to the January 12th earthquake or those children who’ve already been accepted as a referral by families working with an adoption service provider. New adoption cases aren’t currently being processed.

There is consideration of a policy to allow children in desperate circumstances to enter to the United States on a special humanitarian visa – but there are not yet details regarding which children might qualify and what their status would be regarding adoption.

There is still much chaos and confusion in Haiti and many families are still trying to locate their loved ones. We were encouraged to know that the US government is very serious about not placing children who could still have a family or would not be appropriate for adoption. Our hearts and prayers are going out to the people of Haiti – especially the orphans in that country. When Haiti does have children available for adoption it is our agency’s intention to help find families for those orphans. If your family is interested in Haitian adoption, please email info@awaa.org with the subject “Haiti adoption interest.” We’ll compile a list of names and email addresses and inform families when there is more information.

By: Proud2Adopt

Proud2Adopt — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:03:42 +0000

EthioChinaadopt – the issue is that if someone is paying $30,000 to adopt a child, they want a baby! Its as simple as that! I’m really tired of hearing about how so many of these kids are just split from their parents. Lets get the 380,000 kids that were ALREADY orphans OUT of the country & into waiting homes, that way the focus of orphanages can be on those children who are NEW orphans or split from parents & families. The reality to me is, I would LOVE to adopt one of these children. No, this isn’t a NEW passion spurred from seeing photos on TV. But hopefully with the dire situation they will waive much of the 25K+ fees for families like mine to adopt one of these children here! Amen!

By: somedaymama

somedaymama — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 04:26:05 +0000

Honest to God, I am about to lose it!

As RQ has said, many of these children face certain death! I am certain that there are many, many families – even on this very site, that would take any one of these children into their homes in a heartbeat. For many of us, this is not even about growing our own family, but rather offering a bed, food and a loving family until such time as their permanent family can be located or established. Isn’t that better than dying in the street or being sold into slavery?

If, in the end, they need permanent placement in our homes, so be it. But, we are so far from knowing their long term needs right now. Let’s just get as many as possible into safe homes.

This really isn’t about what PAPs want, it’s about what PAPs might be able to provide.

By: mew

mew — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:50:44 +0000

Bravo RQ for breaking your own rules. I hope much good will come from this post. I have just contacted SoS Clinton at the State Department re: increasing staff processing the children. Will keep my fingers crossed!

By: windthrow

windthrow — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:46:07 +0000

Am not sure who you are referring to when you say “these people” RQ. All I took out of that article is that there is a fairly large group of people who think that everything possible should be done to help these children with the sole qualification that adoption should be left out of it in these early stages after the disaster.

By: RumorQueen

RumorQueen — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:33:15 +0000

Right Windthrow, because those Jewish children would have been so much better off to have been left in Germany and put into concentration camps. Anne Frank didn’t have to deal with pesky therapy later in life – she was so much better off staying put… right?

(that was sarcasm, for those that missed it)

Seriously, do some of these people think it better to leave kids to an almost certain death than to rescue them?

I just don’t get it.

By: windthrow

windthrow — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 02:08:55 +0000

A somewhat related article

http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/01/tragedy-exploited-a-sad-history-repeating-itself-in-haiti/

By: portlandval

portlandval — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 22:59:16 +0000

It was very easy to submit a comment on the SoS Clinton website using my own language for the information posted above and url below. I hope there is a speed up for it truly could mean life and death for these kids.

office: 202-647-4000

Or you can use their email/comment page:

http://tinyurl.com/yldz9hf

By: Mayken

Mayken — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 21:28:31 +0000

Rumor Queen, thanks, that sounds fairly reasonable. Better than my blabbering at them all un-rehearsed on the phone. They were quite polite, of course, though I got the usual “we’ll look into this” type answer. But I will be very surprised if we don’t hear something positive about this in short order.

By: tearoses1

tearoses1 — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 21:18:05 +0000

chinese children adoption international (once a china-only agency), began offering haitian adoptions months ago. efforts to help ramping up. http://www.chinesechildren.org for more info.