China halts most international adoptions

Beijing will no longer allow foreigners to adopt children from China unless they are adopting the children or stepchildren of blood relatives, China’s foreign ministry said Thursday. The United States State Department said that hundreds of American families were in the process of finalizing adoptions from China, according to the Associated Press. International adoptions had largely been on hold since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic when China suspended nearly all pending cases, according to the U.S. State Department. Officials issued 16 visas to U.S. families for adoptions from China between October 2022 and September 2023, according to the U.S. State Department. They were the first adoptions completed in more than two years.

Why are adoptions being halted? Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning did not give a reason for the change beyond saying it was in line with international conventions. The decision comes as China is grappling with a shrinking population stemming from persistently low birth rates even after Beijing in 2015 lifted the one-child policy. The government adopted a three-child policy in 2021 and has been trying to encourage young people to have more children.

The controversial one-child policy, introduced in 1980, led many families to prioritize having a son and to abandon baby girls and children with disabilities, according to a report published last year in the journal Nature. Many of those children were adopted by international families. The policy also led to a rise in the number of abortions of baby girls, according to the report.

How many babies have been adopted from China? Since 1992 when Beijing began allowing international adoptions, more than 160,000 Chinese children have been welcomed into families around the world, according to China’s Children International. American families adopted more than 82,600 of those children, according to the U.S. State Department.

How have adoption agencies responded? In a statement released Thursday, Cherish Children Adoption International said the news was devastating but that the organization would continue charity efforts that benefit orphanages in China. Holt International also said it would continue its in-country programs for orphaned and vulnerable children, while counseling families impacted by the policy change. In a statement to WORLD, Lifeline Children’s Services President and Executive Director Herbie Newell wrote that the organization was deeply saddened by the decision and was concerned for the wellbeing of the orphans left in China.

Dig deeper: Listen to Lindsay Mast’s report on The World and Everything in It about a family that waited four years to bring their adopted daughter home from China.