Abandonments at the National Level in Romania - Part 4

The Offer? - Absolutely Nothing!

The maternity hospital in Valcea has a social worker who is supposed to care for the "bureaucracy" involved with getting children declared abandoned. There are other hospitals in the county, however, who don't benefit from this kind of help, although the law requires them to have someone take over this responsibility.

The 34 children abandoned so far this year in Valcea, include children between the ages of a couple days and 5 years. Among them, 16 newborns were placed with foster parents, while another 4 with diseases like syphillis and other deformities were put in orphanages. One child is in foster care in Bucharest with a view to being adopted. Only one was reintegrated into the birth family. Another 12 children are with foster parents. At the end of June, there were no abandoned children in hospitals in Valcea.

There are, however, 12 families who would like to adopt and another six who are waiting to be approved to adopt. However, for a long time, the offer of a child has been nonexistant. There are no children deemed legally adoptable. The explanation is quite simple. The procedure under the new law is extremely difficult. An abandoned child can only be declared adoptable after much, much time has passed. During this time, attempts are made to reintegrate the child into the birth family or extended birth family. Usually many months pass before someone from the birth family can be found. The record for length of time is a girl of 14 who was abandoned in 1996. The search for relatives to the fourth degree lasted eight years and was finalized last year when her step-father was found and he agreed to accept her into his home.