The news that China is ending intercountry adoptions resulted in a flood of media coverage, most of which missed the crux of the issue. The decision will result in more children with medical special needs spending their childhood in orphanages instead of with loving families.
Instead of emphasizing this point, most of the U.S.-based media stories employ a maladaptive both-sides-ism approach: On the one hand, adoption has resulted in tens of thousands of children leaving orphanages to join loving families. On the other hand, wouldn’t it have been great if they could have stayed with their birth family? Sure, ideally, all children could live with their birth families, but we must deal with present-day realities.
Matters as serious as this call for Secretary of State Antony Blinken to step in and press China for answers on the kids left behind. Children who cannot be reunified with their birth families or are placed for domestic adoption in China — often the case for children with medical special needs — should have the opportunity to be placed with a loving family via intercountry adoption.
Chinese families seeking to adopt have already been prioritized ahead of American families, and rightly so. But the hard truth here is that the hundreds of children being denied an international adoption have medical special needs. They are not being pursued for adoption within China.
In other words, there are no families within China seeking to adopt these waiting children. As a result, the decision to end intercountry adoption in China is a decision that condemns these kids to a life without family.
The starkest example of this is the 300 children who had been matched for adoption with U.S. families when China halted travel because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Those same children remain in orphanages today. Very few were reunited with birth families or placed domestically for adoption.
These kids have spent the formative years of their lives in orphanages, and with this new decision, they will continue to live in orphanages instead of with permanent, loving families. This should concern everyone who cares about elevating the best interests of children.
Instead of milquetoast entreaties from mid-level bureaucrats, the Department of State should have Blinken address this issue directly. He should advocate for the finalization of these adoptions and make it clear China should honor its decision to entrust these needy children with U.S. families.
Despite the differences and disputes our countries have, intercountry adoption has been a shining example of bilateral cooperation on behalf of children. Indeed, between 1999 and 2023, Americans adopted more than 80,000 children from China, according to State Department data.
Blinken should raise this issue with Chinese authorities and make it clear the U.S. is ready and willing to cooperate on behalf of these 300 children awaiting families — and the many more children and families that would benefit from continued partnership between our nations.
The hundreds of children in China who were matched with a U.S. family have been patiently waiting for years to meet their forever families, this after both countries agreed international adoption is in the best interest of these orphaned kids, in accordance with the Hague Convention.
At the very least, China should honor these in-process adoptions. Blinken should press Beijing for clarity on whether these hundreds of in-process adoptions will finalize and the children in question be united with their matched families in the U.S.
Ryan Hanlon is president and CEO of National Council For Adoption. He lives in northern Virginia with his wife and four children, one of whom was adopted from China in 2018.