China's One-Child Policy To Exempt Parents Whose Children Were Killed During Earthquake

Main Category: Aid / Disasters
Also Included In: Women's Health / Gynecology;  Pediatrics / Children's Health
Article Date: 29 May 2008 - 9:00 PST

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Chinese officials from Sichuan province on Monday announced that parents whose children were killed, severely injured or disabled during the May 12 earthquake in the region would be exempt from the country's one-child-per-family policy, the New York Times reports (Jacobs, New York Times, 5/27).

The exemption, issued by the Chengdu Population and Family Planning Committee, aims to clarify the existing policy for the thousands of parents whose children were killed during the earthquake, according to an unnamed committee official.

The one-child policy limits most urban couples to one child and most rural couples to two children, the AP/Google.com reports. Under the exemption, parents could apply for legal permission to have another child. The exemption also says that if a child born illegally was killed during the quake, the parents will no longer have to pay fines for that child. Previously paid fines will not be refunded.

If a couple's legally born child was killed and they have another child under age 18, that child can be registered as the legal child, which will provide the child with previously denied rights, including no-cost education for nine years. In addition, there are no limits on the number of earthquake orphans a family can adopt under the exemption. The adoptions, as well as a future birth to a family that adopts an orphan, will not face the limitations of the policy, the AP/Google.com reports (Anna, AP/Google.com, 5/26). Couples over age 50 who lost their only child will also be paid an annual stipend of 600 yuan, or about $86, as part of the exemption.

According to AFP/Australian Broadcasting Corporation, several thousand children were among the estimated 65,000 killed in the earthquake, with more than 23,000 still missing (AFP/Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 5/27).

PRI's "The World" on Tuesday included a discussion with China correspondent Mary Kay Magistad about the exception (Werman, "The World," PRI, 5/27).

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