In an interview for El Dia newspaper, child abuse specialist Ana García explains that child abandonment is more frequent than most people would imagine. From 2018 to Oct. 31, 2019, an average of 11 children per month are abandoned by their parents.
These children fall under the care of the National Children’s Council (Conani). Conani operates seven temporary abandoned children shelters nationwide.
She explained hospitals are the place of choice for the parents to leave their children. Children are also left in churches, bus stops and even caves and cemeteries. She said there 23 cases of abandoned newborns have been registered over the past two years. She explained the psychological trauma of the children who grow up not knowing where they come from or who their relatives are.
Natalia Asmar, head of Conani’s Social Programmes and Services, said that efforts are made to locate the parent. If this is not successful, a legal declaration of abandonment needs to be processed through the Children’s Court.
During this time, the child enters Conani’s protection system and receives medical check-ups, physiotherapy, schooling, food and psychological therapies.
Crisis intervention therapy is applied to children over the age of seven to help them adapt to their new situation.
Conani also deals with the legal process of obtaining a birth certificate, the declaration of state of abandonment, the parental suspension certificate to officially disassociate the child from original family ties, explains Giovanni Hernández, head of the Conani’s Adoption Department. He added that the pre-adoption process can take up to two and a half years, but once completed, the child is placed on the adoption waiting list. He said when a child is voluntarily given to Conani, as established by the Code for the Protection of Children’s Rights, a new family is found in less than four months.
Conani receives between 150 and 160 applications for adoptions each year.
Thirty percent of the applications are from foreigners and 70% are local. Spain is the foreign country from where most requests to adopt comes from.
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El Dia
8 January 2020