Adoption STAR’s Director of Adoption Kathy Crissey was recently interviewed by WKBW-TV for a story about a medical crisis that’s plaguing our nation.
Our agency was honored to be contacted by the local ABC affiliate in Western New York, WKBW, to contribute to a story that aired on the nightly news on 2/4/16. The story focused on the opiate epidemic in the United States of America and its effects on thousands of newborn babies. As the story itself indicated, an opiate addicted baby is born every 19 minutes in our country.
Adoption STAR’s Director of Adoption Kathy Crissey, who was interviewed for the story, made it very obvious that our agency is not immune to this opiate/heroin epidemic. In 2015, 26% of the newborn infants Adoption STAR placed were classified as “at risk,” many of who were exposed to opiates during pregnancy; that’s triple the number of “at risk” placements when compared and contrasted to agency statistics from the early 2000’s. Kathy said, “We will work to get pregnant women into substance abuse programs, so that for as much of the pregnancy they are working with us, we can help them stay clean.”
As a result of the opiate epidemic plaguing the country, prospective adoptive parents owe it to themselves to research how opiate use during pregnancy can affect the unborn child. “It’s changed the educational process in terms of what are the substances people need to be educated about now,” says Crissey.
To see the full news story, please click on the following link: Baby born addicted to opiates every 19 minutes