HAVEN FOR THE CHILDREN

Parental alcohol and drug abuse is producing a population explosion of
battered and neglected children, overwhelming the nation's child welfare

and family court systems and shattering the traditional disposition to
keep children with their natural parents.

From 1986 to 1997, the number of abused and neglected children jumped
from 1.4 million to 3 million, a 114 percent increase, more than eight
times greater than the 14 percent increase in the children's population.

At least seven -- some professionals say nine -- of 10 cases of child
abuse and neglect are caused or exacerbated by alcohol and drug abuse
and addiction. Children whose parents abuse alcohol and drugs are
almost three times likelier to be abused and more than four times
likelier to be neglected.

Alcohol is the prime culprit. In a recent survey by the National
Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, 89
percent of child welfare professionals, family court judges and child
advocates named alcohol alone and in combination with illegal or
prescription drugs as the number one drug abused by parents who abuse
and neglect their children.

Each year 500,000 babies are born prenatally exposed to illicit drugs
and usually alcohol and tobacco as well. These children are up to
three times likelier to be abused and neglected. Each year 20,000
infants of drug- and alcohol-abusing mothers are abandoned at birth or
kept in the hospital for their own protection because no foster care
is available.

Caseloads are impossible. Caseworkers in some areas are responsible
for 50 cases at once, and some judges confront 50 child welfare cases
a day.

Few child welfare professionals have been trained to identify
substance abuse and addiction, much less know what to do when they
spot it, and virtually all judges learn on the job. Two-thirds of
reported cases of child abuse and neglect are not investigated.

As the need for home services for parents and children in the child
welfare system has soared, the number of families receiving such help
has plummeted from 1.2 million to 500,000 over the past two decades.
Most parents who need treatment don't get it, and the treatment given
those who do is often inappropriate. These parents are predominantly
women, often themselves victims of violence and abandoned by fathers
who have walked out on their responsibilities. They need therapy
attentive to their problems, combined with literacy and job and
parenting training. Most available treatment is geared toward men.

Child welfare workers have long viewed terminating parental rights as
a failure. But abuse of alcohol, crack cocaine, methamphetamine and
marijuana -- the drugs professionals most frequently encounter in
child abuse cases -- has shattered this time-honored precept. Where
drug- and alcohol-abusing parents are concerned, the failure often
rests in perpetuating such rights at the expense of the child's
development.

In early childhood, the rapid pace of intellectual, physical,
emotional and spiritual development is in head-on collision with the
months, sometimes

years, often marked by relapses, that drug- and alcohol-addicted
parents

may need to get the monkey off their back. The time that parents
require to conquer their addiction can pose a serious threat to their
children, who

may suffer permanent damage during a period of development in which
weeks are windows of opportunity that can never be reopened.

For some parents, concern about children can provide the motivation to
seek treatment. But for many, the most insidious aspect of substance
abuse and addiction is its power to destroy the natural parental
instinct to love and care for their children. Eighty-six percent of
professionals surveyed cited lack of motivation as the top barrier to
getting such parents into

treatment.

The cruelest dimension of the tragedy is this: Even if parental rights
are timely terminated when abusive parents refuse to enter treatment
or cannot overcome their addiction, there is no assurance of a safe
haven for their children. Only one in four children available for
adoption is adopted, and children of substance-abusing parents are at
the end of the line. Foster

care, while far better than being abused, rarely offers the lasting
and secure environment that nourishes healthy cognitive development.
And appropriate foster care is in short supply.

What to do? Train caseworkers and family court judges to deal with
drug and alcohol abuse and addiction and greatly increase their
numbers. Provide timely treatment and training to parents. Increase
incentives for foster care and adoption.

Do we have the money to do this? In a society that last year spent
more money on cosmetic surgery, hairpieces and makeup for men than on
child welfare services for children of substance-abusing parents, the
answer is a resounding yes. I nominate these children and their
parents for first dibs on the burgeoning federal budget surplus and
the money that the states get from the tobacco settlement.

This is a far better investment than adding felonies to the federal
criminal code and throwing more parents in prison, as some in Congress
and the administration suggest. Criminalizing a child welfare system
that should be driven by compassion and health care may be responsive
to the polls, but it does little to help children of drug- and
alcohol-abusing parents. They need stable and secure homes now to give
them a chance for productive (and taxpaying) lives in the future.

The writer is president of the National Center on Addiction and
Substance Abuse at Columbia University. He was secretary of health,
education and welfare from 1977 to 1979.