State takes away 200 pound 8-year-old from parents.

It’s becoming a more and more popular question: Is a child’s unhealthy weight grounds for removing him or her from a household? It was enough for county officials to place a Cleveland third grader who weighed 200 pounds into foster care, according to The Plain Dealer. The Plain Dealer reports that the 8-year-old was taken from school by social workers in October and his mother, who adamantly claims she had been trying to help him lose weight, only sees him for two hours every week. It calls this the first case of a child being taken from a parent over a weight-related issue in Cuyahoga County and it marks a stronger national debate on the topic:

Cuyahoga County does not have a specific policy on dealing with obese children. It removed the boy because case workers considered this mother‘s inability to get her son’s weight down a form of medical neglect, said Mary Louise Madigan, a spokeswoman for the Department of Children and Family Services.
They said that the child‘s weight gain was caused by his environment and that the mother wasn’t following doctor’s orders — which she disputes.

I think it's ridiculous and a violation of rights. It's not abuse and foster care doesn't have the best track record to begin with. This is absolute BS.

Maybe it was a 200lb 40 year old masquerading as an 8 year old.

We've seen that before.

I've was involved in a child custody case where one parent's failure to keep a child on a diet recommended by her doctor cost the mother primary custody. And that child was not morbidly obese. Judges take this shit seriously.

It isn't child abuse by the parent; but abuse of parental rights!

This is just the beginning. They will find more excuses to separate children from parents.

I've seen underweight children pulled from parental custody, Anyone seen a pic of the kid? Unless he's Samoan that shit aint right. Do they roll him to school?

Some parents need to be separated from their kids.

Again, I repeat the kid is an honor roll student and was in a loving home. This isn't a case of starving a child to the point of skin and bones where there is imminent harm, or even possibly death by neglect. Two different things. Being overweight has health consequences down the road, long term (if the child doesn't outgrow it and lose weight eventually) sort of like parents who are smokers who smoke around their children all the time.

Interesting enough you don't hear CPS taking children away from parents who are chronic smokers. Yet smoking poses more of a health risk in my opinion.

I think this is just downright absurd that the state did this. The trauma of being taken away from his parents could cause serious psychological problems.

he had a machine monitoring his breathing at night due to severe apnea... which increases your odds of dying in your sleep 30%.

Apparently theyve been trying to help this woman with her kid for over a year to no avail.

http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders...den-death-time

Quote: "Such a case may be dramatic, and, indeed, the obesity epidemic is the single biggest health crisis facing this country and its kids. But forcing heavy children out of their homes is not the solution.
Our laws give enormous authority to parents and rightly so. The only basis for compelling medical treatment against a parent’s wishes are if a child is at imminent risk of death — meaning days or hours — and a proven cure exists for what threatens to kill them. Obesity does not pass these requirements.
The risk of death from obesity is real, but it is way down the road for kids. There is no proven cure for obesity. The ability to treat a child with diet or a lifestyle change who does not want to be "treated" by strangers is a long shot at best. The number of kids involved — an estimated 2 million children with body-mass index above the 99th percentile — would quickly swamp already overwhelmed social service departments. And, no matter what you do with overweight children, sooner or later they are going back home where their often overweight parents will still be"

"We live in a society that is awash in food. Everywhere you turn, from billboards, to television, to magazines to the radio, someone is trying to tell you to rush down to a fast-food joint, an all you can eat buffet at the mall, to imbibe more sugary drinks or consume the largest portions ever to fall off a plate at your local steakhouse or rib joint. Add to this the fact that barely anyone in the entire nation is moving around — including kids, for whom gym, recess and sports are fast becoming topics for history class. Overall, you have a population lumbering toward XXXL.
But before we start grabbing porky youths out of their homes and sending them off to government fat camps, might we try to change our food culture? This means doing what we have done for smoking. Demonize the companies that sell and market food that is not nutritious. That means you, candy, soda, fried food and snack food outfits. Tax them too. And get Hollywood and television to make overeating and not exercising uncool just like they did with smoking. Put exercise back on the menu for all school kids.
I am not letting parents off the hook. But, putting the blame for childhood obesity on the home and then arguing that moving kids out of homes where obesity reigns is the answer is short-sighted and doomed to fail. We need the nation to go on a diet together and the most important places to start are at the grocery store, schools and media."



http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43727876.../#.TtUBpvJnruk

So what is the state going to do if the foster parents can't get the boy's weight down or when or if his grads start to drop?

So what is the state going to do if the foster parents can't get the boy's weight down or when or if his grads start to drop? Originally Posted by OliviaHoward

I suspect that the Foster parents won't be able to do much. In the meantime.. yes you can bet his grades will go down while in foster care. Not to mention how this will have permanently left a scar on this kid for the rest of his life. So now when he does go back to his parents.. he will need psychological counseling to get past what has been done.

Which is worse...not reporting to police but your superior that someone told you they had seen an adult in the shower with a kid or this fat little kid dying in his sleep?

Do you folks want less government or more?

It seems, you want. like everyone else I might add, the government that you want.

It is never as simple as it seems.

Maybe it was a 200lb 40 year old masquerading as an 8 year old.

We've seen that before. Originally Posted by TheDaliLama

I bet you have!