The B.C. Government is ending the use of birth alerts effective immediately.
Birth alerts are a ‘child welfare practice’ that have been used in provincial hospitals for decades. The alerts are issued without the consent of expecting parents when there is a potential safety risk to infants at birth.
“We are changing the way we work with and support high-risk expectant parents to keep newborns safe and families together through a collaborative, rather than an involuntary, model,” Conroy said, in a statement. “Health care providers and social service workers will no longer share information about expectant parents without consent from those parents and will stop the practice of birth alerts.”
Conroy goes on to say that birth alerts have been primarily issued for Indigenous women.
“We acknowledge the trauma women experience when they become aware that a birth alert has been issued. We also heard calls to end this practice from Indigenous communities, organizations and the report from the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls,” Conroy added.
The B.C. Green spokesperson for Children and Family Development, Sonia Furstenau, says the change is long overdue.
“Birth alerts have long been recognized as damaging and violent. They target women and infants at the most vulnerable and critical moment of their lives,” Furstenau said. “The evidence is overwhelming: when we separate moms and babies, we are creating long-term problems for both of them.”
The province will instead move to a voluntary approach of providing early supports and services to expecting parents, which is hoped will lead to a more trusting relationship between parents and service providers.
“This step is consistent with my mandate from Premier John Horgan to provide better supports to keep Indigenous children at home and out of care,” Conroy added.
“It responds directly to the recommendation from the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls to stop using birth alerts and reflects our commitment to implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Calls to Action.”
Back in July, Conroy told NL News that the province will look into its processes for the birth alert system.
The review came after an Indigenous newborn, called Baby H, was seized two days after being born at Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops, although the ministry did not link the incident to the review.
Of the nearly 6,500 children in the care of the provincial government, the BC Green’s estimate that two thirds are Indigenous.
