Abandonments at the National Level in Romania - Part 3

Stories from Children Returned to their birth families

The village of Varbila is a poor village. Much too poor for a Romania that is preparing to enter the gates of the European Union. There are also many Gypsies. Today these Gypsies are no longer slaves, but they seem just as poor as they did in bygone days. In their little huts, where you bump your head every time you enter and exit, a whole host people squeeze together. One more child, along with those already existing in this house, means one more mouth to feed, one more child in a bed already full of children, more clothes to buy, etc.

A Pretty Lie

The village of Varbila does not have a medical clinic, consultations are given in the school, in a basement where at the window gather clusters of children from the village to see undressed babies. At one time, examinations were done in the school office from among lists, or in a classroom on the teacher's desk. Then they found the solution of using the basement. Finally, the county commissioner decided to transform the old bar in the village to a dispensary/clinic. That left the drunks in Varbila without a 'place to work.' So they did this because of the fact that women from there have babies, but prefer not to take them home. Just last year four of them gave birth in a hospital in Bucharest, where they also left their babies. So they could hide their past, women from Varbila didn't give their address like it is recorded on their identity card: village of Varbila, Community of Iordacheanu, county of Prahova. They said they were from the village of 'Virbilan' or from the community of 'Iordachioaia', or other variations of these same names. They didn't have a big enough imagination. Thus, the newborns were reintegrated into their families.

Better

Christina M. gave birth last year to a little boy, Valentin. As she said before she gave birth, she had health problems for which she was hospitalized. The child was also born with health problems. His spinal chord was operated on and his life was hanging by a thread. "He stayed a long time in the hospital, as he weighed only 4 pounds at birth, says the mother, but I wasn't able to stay that long with him. I didn't have any way to pay for the hospitalization, we didn't even have anything to eat. I went home and left him there. After a while I went back after him. Now he's with us at home, he is a year and 4 months old but he is always sick. We always have problems with him. And here in the village there's not any possibility to be helped. I never thought of abandoning him, but wouldn't he have been better off with a family who is better of materially and could offer him more, than with us?"

In the first quarter of the year in maternity hospitals in Prahova, there were 32 abandonments of babies. In the official report from the National Adoption Committee there reported only 7. At present there are 37 approved families, signed up on a list to adopt a child, but at the county level in Prahova there are no adoptable children. (Nina Marcu)