General Information

In China there are many children with special needs. The children in our Waiting Children’s Program represent a wide range of special needs. Some of the children’s needs may be more minor, correctable, medical needs and others may be more complex. All of the children can benefit enormously from living in a family. The following are some examples of what is considered to be a special needs condition in China.

• Cleft Lip/Cleft Palate
  
• Club Foot
  
• Cardiovascular/Congenital Heart Disease
  
• Hearing Impairment
  
• Visual Impairment
  
• Neurological Impairment
  

If you are open to adopting a child with special needs, this will have to be addressed in your application letter and your provincial approval letter. You must have completed your homestudy process before you are able to access our Waiting Children’s Program, Green Stream Program.

The Ministry of Community and Social Services and the China Centre of Adoption Affairs requires all families who participate in our Waiting Children’s Program to have identified in their homestudy that they want to adopt a child with special needs and the family must demonstrate the ability to support the child both financially and emotionally.

The family must also proceed through a screening process with the Children’s Bridge. Cathy Murphy, the Coordinator of the Waiting Children’s Program will complete the screening process for each prospective family.

We encourage you to thoroughly research and specify what special need(s) you feel you could support within your family unit. It is important that you think about the specific needs of the child and be realistic about the needs your family can handle. Your application letter must clearly identify the special need(s). For example it would be too general to say that you would like to support a child with special needs under the age of two in China. Instead, you must state clearly the specific needs you can support. A more specific example would state: Our family could support a child with special needs who has a cleft lip or cleft palate between 12 months – 2 years of age.

Each family applying to the Waiting Children’s program will be expected to complete additional paperwork and explore the resources available to them within their community as it pertains to the special need(s) of the child they are proposing to adopt. If the appropriate resources are not accessible within your region it can affect the ability to qualify for our Waiting Children’s Program.

Considerations

• The majority of the children are between 14 months – 4 years of age at time of referral to the Waiting Children’s Program.
  
• Limited health information is provided with each referral.
  
• A limited history since coming to the orphanage is provided
  
• The adoption is finalized in China.
  
• Your file will be expedited in the Waiting Children’s program.
  
• 4 - 5 months after your LID (log in date) at the CCAA (China Centre of Adoption Affairs) you should expect to receive your child..
  
• Girls and boys are available for adoption through the Waiting Children’s Program Green Stream Program.
  
• The family must travel to China to complete the adoption.
  

Requirements

• Applicants must have reached the age of 30 and be under 55 years of age. Please note: The upper limit of 55 is ONLY FOR THE CHINA WAITING CHILDREN - GREEN STREAM PROCESS. The upper limit the mainstream China program is 50.
  
• No same sex couples or single applicants permitted to apply.
  
• Couples must be married for 2 years and have no more than 2 previous marriages. If previously married, current marriage must be minimum 5 years in length.
  
• You must be free from criminal record and in good physical and emotional health.
  
• Applicants must be free from the following conditions: AIDS, cancer, intellectual disability, infectious disease, blind, deaf, physical disability, lupus, epilepsy, schizophrenia, less than two years after stopping medication for mental illness such as depression, 10 years post surgery of organ transplantation, 10 years free of drinking if history of alcohol abuse.
  
• Cannot be noticeably overweight (BMI (Body Mass Index) cannot exceed 40) You can go to www.nnlbisupport.com/bmi to calculate your BMI
  
• Both applicants must have a high school education (or equivalent vocational education) or higher.
  
• The family’s net worth cannot be lower than $80,000 US (for conversion to CAD go to www.xe.com/ucc.convert.cgi)
  
• Family must have fewer than 5 children in the home with the youngest at least one year of age.
  
• At least one of a couple MUST be a Canadian citizen.
  

Process

• Completion of a home study and approval in Ontario.
  
• Screening process completed by Children’s Bridge for the Waiting Children’s Program.
  
• Waiting Children files are received at the Children’s Bridge office approximately every 3 months.
  
• Once approved, the file is expedited quite quickly in China.
  
• Six-month supervision is required by the adoption practitioner.
  
• The China Centre of Adoption Affairs requires post placement reports
  

Timelines

• Completion of home study is dependent on the family.
  
• Screening process at Children’s Bridge will take approximately 2 weeks.
  
• Approval in Ontario takes between 6 and 12 weeks
  
• Children’s Bridge will then forward all relevant materials to the CCAA
  
• In China (Basic Information About the Prospective adoptive Parent(s),
  
• Letter of Intent to Adopt a Child with Special Needs and Notice of Coming from the CCAA).
  
• The Waiting Children’s Files are then expedited and the family travels to China to complete the adoption.
  
• Post placement information and post adoption reports are a requirement of this program.