Of Opiates and Foster Homes

By DON ROLLINS

Every system and institution in America has in some way been impacted by opiate misuse. It’s an insidious Big Pharma induced plague, wrecking lives, draining resources, and mostly frustrating our best efforts to stop its spread. And we’re all paying dearly for it.

But not every system has been impacted in the same way. Or to the same degree.

Often buried in public discussions of opiate misuse is a system bearing the true brunt of our progressive toxification: foster care. A mixed asset even prior to the onset of this scourge, the US Department of Human Health Services estimates 10,000 children and youth per year enter foster care for the first time; and the current total is a record 400,000, making it even more challenging for overloaded foster care agencies to recruit, support and oversee responsible foster caregivers.

While these figures include kids in placement for other reasons - mostly neglect, abuse, ill or deceased parents and outright abandonment - the vast majority of those in and entering the system come from living situations in which the adults in their lives are addicted to substances. And for the past decade the substances most often documented are opiate-based, including fentanyl, the drug’s most concentrated form.

The relationship between increased opiate misuse and record levels of children in foster care almost certainly has to do with another factor: the age of those most likely to misuse. While opiate abusers represent a broad spectrum by way of race, region and other demographics, researchers cite the group most at risk are in their 20s and 30s — prime years for having children.

There is also historical precedence for understanding this symbiotic tie. As contributors Emily Birnbaum and Maya Lora cite in an online article published in The Hill (June 2018), the numbers of children in foster care spiked in correlation with similar mass drug crises — crack in the 1990s, and meth in the early 2000s.

But none of these numbers and trends capture the myriad stressors in the lives of the actual children and youth placed in foster care. Even when placed with family members and/or siblings, the change in place, people, food, routines — often schools and friends — creates uncertainty if not chaos. Add to the mix the high probability these children have experienced sustained trauma, and undiagnosed learning challenges.

In light of the disorganization and staff turnover that defines this administration, we can’t know for sure who’s actually tasked with combating opiate misuse on this scale. But credit is due, for federal laws backed by the White House and enacted last fall resulted in $1 billion earmarked for opiate misuse prevention and treatment — a respectable chunk set aside for treating parents whose children have been placed in foster care settings.

This is significant. Still, as with anything related to opiate misuse, it’ll take more than dollars to free suffering addicts from their chains, let alone reclaim their children. Without due research, master planning and good leadership, this could be just one more squandered opportunity. Yet the list of coordinating agencies is impressive, and the action plans include money for scientific research and applications, not just repeating what’s been done.

Sure, even the best of outcomes will amount to but one victory in a very long war. But if only for the sake of the kids who are at this very moment living in somebody else’s house, we’ll take it.

Don Rollins is a Unitarian Universalist minister and substance abuse counselor living in Pittsburgh, Pa. Email donaldlrollins@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, June 1, 2019

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