FOCUS - While India, bruised by the second wave, has exceeded 300,000 deaths from Covid-19, an increase in the number of orphans, exposed to all types of trafficking and exploitation, worries NGOs.

The baby was barely crying. The news shook India bruised by its second wave of covid-19: in Pune, in the south of the country, a child of a few months was found near the body of his mother, who died of the disease several days earlier, tells The Times of India . The neighbors had not dared to approach for fear of being contaminated.

In the chaos of the epidemic, what becomes of the children of the 300,000 deceased from covid-19? The authorities counted on Wednesday, May 27, 577 new children who lost both parents to the coronavirus and were placed in orphanages during the month of April. But that's without counting all those who vanish in nature. Illegal adoptions, prostitution, forced labor: in India, 50,000 children go missing each year. It was before the pandemic.

The situation is chaotic, people are afraid. They dare not approach a potentially sick child

Akancha Shrivastava

A woman is being investigated over allegations of medical child abuse for falsely ascribing illnesses to her 6-year-old adopted daughter, Q13 Fox Seattle reports.

Sophie Hartman adopted her daughter from Africa as an infant and over the last four years, the child has had over 500 “unnecessary” medical appointments and procedures, including a surgically implanted feeding tube and well as a cecostomy tube, to help flush the intestines, according to court documents.

"This situation is a case of medical child abuse,” a report from the child’s care team reads. "It is not necessary to know the possible motivation of a caregiver, only the outcome of the behavior. It is my concern that this pattern has resulted in unnecessary medical testing, medication, procedures, surgeries and debility of this child."

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Baby Farming, A Victorian Horror Story

Even the most sheltered among us have heard horror stories of foster care and adoption, but back before there were arms of government to protect wards of the state, there were orphanages. And before orphanages, there was baby farming.

“Baby farming” was a term coined during the Victorian Era to describe the practice of taking custody of unwanted children or those whose parents were unable to care for them, for a small fee. Essentially, a baby farm was a for-profit orphanage. The practice of baby farming was most widespread in urban areas of late-Victorian Era England, but it was also prevalent in North America and Oceania.

In an era when the most prevalent form of contraception was abortion, for working-class Victorian women who found themselves unable to care for a child, a less dangerous alternative was to surrender their newborn or, “put them out to nurse” at baby farms for a small weekly fee. Most women who chose this route assumed that their child would be properly cared for and receive a wet nurse, attention, room and board at the very least. After all, as referenced heavily in the writings of Jane Austen, wealthier women were also known to put their infants in the care of wet nurses – women who were not the childrens’ biological mothers, but who would breastfeed the children. The fictional character Grenouille of Perfume, as well as the titular character of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist were both residents of baby farms.

In 1834, The Poor Law Amendment Act allowed poor, unwed mothers to be given food, money, or clothing from the parish only if they went to live in the workhouse. According to the Ultimate History Project, because of the extremely dire conditions of work houses, “many of the women eligible for workhouse placement chose to place their children elsewhere so that they could continue to work and earn money – outside of the workhouse.”

Even the most sheltered among us have heard horror stories of foster care and adoption, but back before there were arms of government to protect wards of the state, there were orphanages. And before orphanages, there was baby farming.

“Baby farming” was a term coined during the Victorian Era to describe the practice of taking custody of unwanted children or those whose parents were unable to care for them, for a small fee. Essentially, a baby farm was a for-profit orphanage. The practice of baby farming was most widespread in urban areas of late-Victorian Era England, but it was also prevalent in North America and Oceania.

In an era when the most prevalent form of contraception was abortion, for working-class Victorian women who found themselves unable to care for a child, a less dangerous alternative was to surrender their newborn or, “put them out to nurse” at baby farms for a small weekly fee. Most women who chose this route assumed that their child would be properly cared for and receive a wet nurse, attention, room and board at the very least. After all, as referenced heavily in the writings of Jane Austen, wealthier women were also known to put their infants in the care of wet nurses – women who were not the childrens’ biological mothers, but who would breastfeed the children. The fictional character Grenouille of Perfume, as well as the titular character of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist were both residents of baby farms.

Story at a glance

The Supreme Court is expected to make a decision in a case over religious foster care agencies discriminating against same-sex couples.

The case pits religious conservatives and those who don’t believe in same-sex marriage against the LGBTQ+ community.

LGBTQ youth are over-represented in the foster care system compared to cisgender and heterosexual youth.

Since the day after the last presidential election, LGBTQ parents and hopefuls have been on edge, waiting for the Supreme Court to decide whether they can have a family of their own.

Mumbai: As many as 2,290 children in Maharashtra have lost either one or both parents to COVID-19 infection so far, sources said on Thursday. While 2,183 children have lost one parent, 107 lost both the parents during the pandemic, the sources in the state Women and Child Development Department said.

"The government has got custody of 10 out of the 107 children as there is nobody to look after them," they said. The data about the orphaned children has been compiled based on the inputs given by the district task forces headed by the collectors.

The government had set up a 10-member task force in each of the 36 districts in the state to identify the children, who were orphaned due to the pandemic.

The task force will also oversee the arrangements of their shelter and supervise their adoption to ensure that there is no trafficking and exploitation.

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A Mother’s Story

We are in a hotel room in a sub-Saharan African metropolis. We sit across from each other on chairs that somehow seem too tall compared to the small coffee table between us. It is late afternoon and the sun is hanging low, just above the rooftops – large, dusty and orange. Yet, the heavy curtains are drawn and the room is cool and the light dim. The sound of rush hour traffic fills up the room and I close the balcony door behind her to avoid any background noise on the recording.

“How old were you when you got pregnant?” I ask as I sit back down.

“I was 16. Same age as she is now”.

She tells me that she was in a relationship with the child’s father but that the pregnancy was not planned. She was still in school and her mother got so angry that she threw her out of the house. They found a rental home but money was tight and they were not able to give their daughter what she needed.

Hundreds of women who were forced to give up babies for adoption in the 1950s, 60s and 70s are demanding a formal government apology.

Many of the women were unmarried teenagers when they became pregnant, and gave birth in church-run “mother and baby homes” in the UK.

An estimated quarter of a million women were coerced into having babies adopted during the period. In recent years, some have said they were made to feel shame and guilt.

Three years ago, Jill Killington told the Observer: “I was never asked whether I wanted to go ahead with the adoption. It was a fait accompli.”

She became pregnant in 1967 at the age of 16. Her baby Liam was taken from her nine days after she gave birth. “I was expected to just go on with my life as though nothing had happened … I’m certain it has had an impact on my life. There’s a cycle of grief and anger. A kind of melancholy is always there in the back of your mind.”

(CNN)I adopted my daughter from foster care. It took a specialized village to help her succeed.

The day our daughter toddled around a corner of her foster mother's house in a peach pantsuit and flashed my husband and me a mischievous grin, we knew we were her parents.

We also knew we had made the right choice in adopting her from our state foster care system. What we didn't know was how much we'd rely on medical professionals, educators and mentors over the next 13 years to raise her.

She'd had a rough start in life. Relinquished at birth to the state, she spent her first 18 months in a foster home with three other children her age. The repercussions of too-little eye contact and too-little cuddling in that critical first year of life didn't surface until she entered first grade, when she suffered from separation anxiety so severe that we finally pulled her out of the classroom and found her a pediatric psychologist and alternative schooling.

Longing for love