On Thursday the foreign ministry spokesperson from China announced that the country will no longer allow any international adoption, leaving dozens of children with no home.
Karla Thrasher is senior director of international adoptions at Lifeline Children’s Services based in Alabama. She worked with the 48 families that were currently awaiting adoption with Chinese children.
"They were definitely in shock. This came very suddenly," said Thrasher in an interview with Baptist Press. "We actually had thought things were moving in a more positive direction over the past couple of weeks, and then received this email out of the blue regarding China no longer carrying out the foreign adoptions."
Roughly 100 families were set to adopt a child from China before the pandemic shut down everything, including adoptions, in 2020. Since that time due to varying circumstances, roughly half the families could no longer follow through with adoption. Forty-eight families still held on to hope, four years later.
"Some of them were just a couple of pieces of paperwork away from traveling to meet their children and finalizing their adoption," Thrasher said. "That’s how close many of these families were."
The international adoption program had previously run for 30 years before the recent announcement to end it, officially on August 28, 2024.
"Several of these families had actually met their children and spent time with them through a program that we have where we host children here in the United States. Several of these children had been a part of that hosting program where they had come to the US, actually spent time in the family’s home, so these families knew these children."
Lifeline not only works with families to adopt children, but also to help foster children, giving training to those who want. They are the largest evangelical adoption organization in the U.S.A.
"Even yesterday, amidst all of the sadness, the Lord reminded us of those families that did get to travel and those children that did have homes. It’s important to celebrate that as well."
The children who would have been adopted in China now have to live in orphanges. The reality for many of them is that they will age out of orphan care at 16 with no resources and few options other than low wage work, according to Thrasher. They will also have limited medical care and education.