Will Americans Looking To Adopt Be Affected By China Lifting One Child Law?
FORT WASHINGTON, Pa. (CBS) -- With the one child law lifted in China, will that have an impact on Americans looking to adopt from that country?
Living Hope Adoptions in Fort Washington specializes in international adoptions. Samuel Fang, the president, says Americans can only adopt Chinese babies with special needs and the process takes years.
"So we have a family here who are willing to accept children who have some medical condition or correctable condition."
Fang says the official lifting of the one child ban will probably not have an immediate impact on adoptions, but that could change in the long run.
"And people can have more children, that means there could be more children... there can be more special needs children in China because this one child policy finished."
Fang says since 2007 there have been fewer children up for adoption because of a stronger economy.
Playing in the leaves on a beautiful fall day -- nothing particularly special about it, but it's the stuff local mom Jennifer Sallade lives to enjoy with youngest daughter Rachel.
"She has a lot of energy, and she has the best smile int he whole world," she said.
Sallade adopted Rachel two years ago when she was 3.
Sallade says she was drawn to China because of the famous one child rule.
"A lot of families give up the daughter because in culturally if you have one child and they want a boy to carry the family name and especially the Chinese culture still the sons give the social security to the parents," said Fang.
In recent years China eased the policy allowing some parents to have two children. But Thursday in a major announcement Chinese media reported that the government would now allow all parents to have two. Progress in the eyes of Sallade.
Much like the U.S., China faces an aging population with not as many young workers and while many here say this new policy is a step in the right direction they also say changing the culture in China will likely take some time.
"They're just going to have to keep looking at this every year and try to tweak the policy as much as they can," said La Salle Director of Asian Studies Charles Desnoyers.
Sallade says the new policy, while encouraging is still limiting.
"It's still a restriction, and families still don't have a choice for how many children they'd like to have, so I think there's still a problem," she said.
CBS 3's Rahel Solomon contributed to this report.
