Abuse Within America's Foster Care System - Children at Risk

Abuse Within America's Foster Care System - Children at Risk
January 06, 2010 by Janey Falk

Search more A Foster Care Survivor - Part 1
America has a nasty habit of stigmatizing those less fortunate. Children, our most vulnerable citizens, struggle on an every day basis to learn what it means to grow up and be responsible but those children who are unfortunate enough to enter this world in an abusive home have their
chances of a decent life slashed severely by society if not by the trauma they are forced to live through.

In a 2006 ABC News Report (Primetime), Dr. Wade Horn, former child psychologist and Director of the Department of Health and Human Services for George W. Bush, stated that "the foster care system was a giant mess and should just be blown up". He was most critical of the Federal government's way of funding foster care, "$5 billion that goes mostly to keeping kids in foster care". According to Dr. Wade, there was no provisions for treatment, prevention, family support or "aging out" (turned out at 18 yrs. of age). The ways things were set up is to keep everything exactly as they were, supporting the status quo, as it already was. He wanted to rethink foster care on a national level.

Dr. Wade's interview in 2006 was an eye opener for many but anyone who takes a serious look at the foster care system before the year 2000 would either be horrified or in denial that America's children have been put at such risk and many of their problems in adult life can be traced to their time in foster homes.

For the rest of this article, please go to:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2550931/abuse_within_americas_foster_care_system.html?cat=47