As some of you know, under the Hague Convention, children are required to be up to date on all immunizations recommended by the CDC prior to entering the US. In my opinion, for many reasons, it is both cruel and unethical to require newly adopted children to possibly receive several vaccines prior to entering the US. There are reports of children receiving 6-7 vaccines just a couple of days prior to boarding their flight to the US. Below you will find the letter I found and adapted concerning this issue. If you are an adoptive parent, future adoptive parent or a US citizen who finds this requirement as ludicrous as I do, may I ask a favor? Would you please copy and paste this letter, inserting your own personal information, and send it to the Congressional representatives for your state? Not only are you exercising your right as a US citizen, you are helping to protect the health and well being of our children.
You can find the contact information for your state here...
House of Representatives:https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml
Dear (____________________________),
My name is _______________. I am a soon-to-be adoptive Mother of a______________ born in the People's Republic of China. I am writing this letter to ask your office to both quickly and diligently work toward correcting a Congressional oversight in the Hague Convention that effects internationally adopted children. This oversight requires immigrant children adopted from Hague Convention Countries be up to date on all Center for Disease Control (CDC)recommended vaccines prior to entering the United States.
When the Hague Convention was passed, new regulations were issued in the Federal Register on October 30, 2007 at 72 FR 61301. The amendments revised the Department of State regulations to provide for intercountry adoptions that will occur pursuant to the Hague Convention. This provided a new definition of"child" under the Immigration and Nationality Act, amending 101(b)(1)(F) and adding 101(b)(1)(G). Public Law 105-73 provided the exception for newly adopted children from the vaccination requirement by allowing for a written affidavit from the child's soon-to-be physician in lieu of receiving vaccinations abroad. While revising the law for the Hague's implementation, in an apparent oversight, Congress forgot to extend this part of the process. As stated above, this oversight requires these newly adopted children become up to date with all of the CDC's recommended vaccines before they will be granted entry into the US.
It is important to note most of these children come from orphanages in developing countries. Various countries may have given the orphans anywhere from several to no vaccines. Often they have received vaccines relevant to diseases in their country and not required by the CDC. Some may have no medical record or an outdated record of the vaccines they received at the orphanage. Without Public Law 105-73 in place, the newly adopted children would be required to receive the vaccinations again.
As you can imagine, adoption is a very complicated process both emotionally and physically. Taking this into considering, these vulnerable children may be required to receive a mega dose of vaccines all in one day, just days before they board the lengthy international flight home to the U.S. To date, there are reports of children receiving 6-7 injections at their medical exam in Guangzhou China in order to comply with this requirement. In my opinion, this is both cruel and unethical.
As is the case with many children, they may be medically fragile at the time these vaccinations are required. As the law stands, there is no available exemption for anyone, including the medically fragile. If the family wants to return to the United States with their child, the injections are mandatory without exception.
It is important to note, as the law stands today, these vulnerable children are now the only class of U.S. immigrants that are given no possible exemption from their overseas visa immunization requirements. All other U.S. immigrants are allowed the possibility of exemption due to medical necessity or religious or moral grounds. Can it really be this is a result of the Hague Convention which was intended to actually provide MORE protections for these children?
The best way to handle vaccinations, and the way it was done pre-Hague, was once at home the child's Pediatrician orders a blood test to discover the child's titer antibody levels. With test results in hand, the Pediatrician recommends only those vaccines that are shown to be missing, on a safe time schedule.
We ask that your office quickly seek to extend the previous exemption that allowed adopted children to postpone their immigrant visa vaccination requirements until they are safely at home. Such an exemption would be similar to 101(b)(1)(G) Public Law 105-73 which provided the exception for newly adopted children to the vaccination requirement by allowing for a written affidavit in lieu of receiving vaccinations abroad before receiving an immigrant visa.
Thank you for your consideration in this matter. I look forward to your prompt and timely response. The well being of some of America's newest and most vulnerable citizens depends on it.
Regards,(__________name___________________)
citizen of the great state of (__________) and adoptive parent
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