Vietnam and China

IAAP Newsletter - Updates

October 29, 2008

In This Issue

Reminder to China Families

Baby Formula Contamination

Vietnam Adoptions

Quick Links...

Bringing Hope to Children

New Web Site- Children Updates

We now have our new web site up and running. It is
at http://bringinghopetoc
hildren.org (the same address as the old site).

We will be adding new information to the site over the next few days and weeks. We hope it will become a site you will go to often for information concerning adoptions and humanitarian opportunities
in China and Vietnam.

We will be adding more content and will be setting up an auction site there for fundraising items to be sold.

For the New Site Click Here

Reminder to all China Families

If you submitted a dossier to China before April 1, 2008 and you are still waiting on a referral, you must keep your I-600A approval current. If you let your I-600A expire you will be required to submit a new I-800A and the case will be considered an adoption under the Hague rules. This adds considerable cost and time to the process so be sure to keep your I-600A approval current. You can see the expiration date by looking at the approval date in the upper right hand corner of your I-171H. Your I-171H will expire 18 months after that date. Please allow plenty of time for renewal of this form.

Baby Formula Contamination in China

In the last couple of months, there have been many reports of baby formula and other milk-based products in China that have been contaminated with melamine. This was a deliberate act, and has resulted in the deaths of several children and hospitalization of thousands more who face possible kidney damage.

Now we are learning that this heinous act was not limited to milk products. They have found melamine in eggs and farm-raised fish from China, also.

We have heard of a few children who were adopted from China as early as 2005 who have been found to have kidney stones. Since we have no way to find out which formulas were used by the many orphanages in China, and now we must worry about any eggs and fish the children may have eaten, we strongly suggest the following. If you adopted your child after 2005, you should immediately inform your child's doctor of your child's possible/probable exposure to melamine in their diet.

The recommendation of the section on Adoption and Foster Care of the American Academy of Pediatrics: "...the consensus is to do urinalysis and BUN/Creatinine on all children adopted from China from 2005 onward and if abnormal, get a renal ultrasound".

More information can be found on the website of the Centers for Disease Control:

http://emergency.cdc.gov/agent/melamine/chinafood.asp

While we understand that this news is unsettling to you, we consider it to be extremely important to talk to your child's pediatrician soon, and if necessary, arrange these tests. We will keep you informed via this newsletter of any new developments, or recommendations by the CDC or AAP. In the meantime, please carefully read all labels of food products before you buy....check the country of origin....and be careful. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to call us at (423)658-1559.

Cheryl Graham

Vietnam Adoptions

There continues to be no progress on adoptions in Vietnam. Many things still remain unclear. To get a current update on the situation CLICK HERE.