www.reuters.com  

 Monday, April 21, 2003
 REUTERS
 Families Give Up Kids to Get Treatment, Study Says
 by Maggie Fox

 WASHINGTON - Thousands of U.S. parents are being forced to give up their
 mentally ill children to foster care or even the juvenile justice system
 because they cannot otherwise pay for treatment, a report said on Monday.
 The report by the General Accounting Office has probably found only the
 tip of the iceberg, mental health groups said, as only a few states cooperated
 with the investigation. But they said the implications are clear. "Families across

 America are being ripped apart because they can't find the help their children

 with mental and emotional disorders need," Laurel Stine of the nonprofit Bazelton

 Center for Mental Health Law said in a statement.

 The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, was asked to write the report
 by U.S. Senator Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, and Democratic House of
 Representatives members Pete Stark of California and Patrick Kennedy of
 Rhode Island after a series of media reports on the issue. Child welfare directors

 in 19 states, and juvenile justice officials in 19 counties answered survey questions

 for the report. They said more than 12,700 children were placed into some kind of

 care so they could get needed treatment. "Nationwide, this number is likely higher

 because many state child welfare directors did not provide data," the GAO report said.

 "Although no agency tracks these children or maintains data on their
 characteristics, officials said most are male, adolescent, often have
 multiple problems and many exhibit behaviors that threaten the safety of
 themselves and others." But the children had not committed crimes, nor had they

 been abused or neglected, said Elizabeth Adams, a spokeswoman for the National Alliance
 for the Mentally Ill. "When children have mental health problems, they are often demanding on
 the family and family structure," Adams said in a telephone interview. "Sometimes they

 have outbursts and rage and behavior that is destructive to the child and others."

 This requires care -- expensive care that can include intensive counseling
 for the patient and the family, respite care to give parents a break, and
 drug treatment. But many insurance plans will only pay for such treatment

 for a limited time, said Ralph Ibson of the National Mental Health Association.
 And states cannot pay unless the child is in their physical custody. "In extreme

 cases, as this report documents, they literally give up custody to meet the

 requirements as a last-chance opportunity for their children, give up custody

 to a system that will place the kids in mental health services. That's how

 desperate they are," Ibson said. "You have to ask yourself why they can

 supply money for child mental health services in a foster care home and you

 won't give the same money to a parent?" asked Adams.

 ? Copyright 2003 Reuters Ltd