COVID-19 Related Legal Battles Ahead
Negligent Care Facilities Are Accelerating the Spread of Coronavirus. What Can Be Done?
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread out of control in the United States, more people are speaking up about care facilities that are cutting corners, outright disobeying public health mandates, and putting residents, staff, and their entire communities at risk. Nationally, over 40% of COVID deaths are linked to nursing homes. In Illinois, over half of our virus deaths are associated with them. That doesn’t even begin to cover the long-term damage that the virus does to those who survive it.
 You can reach out to your senators and representatives to stand up for safety.
While many states are being pressured by the care industry to shield facilities from liability, there’s an active fight going on to prevent that kind of shield from being federally implemented. The ability to sue facilities who engage in abhorrent negligence and apathy towards patients is crucial to accountability.
Was someone you know placed in a care facility that had known cases of COVID? This kind of direct negligence is wrong and illegal.
July is Minority Mental Health Awareness Month
It’s More Important Than Ever To Recognize The Legal & Moral Priority of Minority Mental Health
One startling current example of how minorities are criminalized instead of given access to resources and treatment is the case of “Grace,” a 15 year old Black girl with ADHD in Michigan. On probation after an altercation, Grace – who received special education services in-person at school – struggled with the transition to online learning during the pandemic. After not completing her homework, Grace was sent to juvenile hall in May, where she remains today – despite the pleas of her mother and outrage by the community.
 A letter from Grace to her mom
Partner Jay Paul Deratany notes how wrong this situation is:
“This is clearly not how a child should be treated – the focus for kids should not be on punishment, but rather rehabilitation and learning. Putting her in a detention center during a pandemic does not help her learn or heal. She needs support, resources, and an independent education plan so that she can grow and have a chance. Would any of this have happened if she were more privileged, white, and wealthy? I doubt it – and that’s a travesty.”
Deratany & Kosner
Jay Paul Deratany’s oped about PTSD in foster youth ran in last month’s issue of Foster Focus! Check out a preview below or read the full article.
The Harsh Reality of PTSD and Foster Children
by Jay Paul Deratany
Most people immediately think of the terror that veterans face and their experiences with PTSD as the pinnacle of the disorder’s prominence. But it’s been well documented that foster youth are even more acutely vulnerable. We’ve chronicled this for years, including in a 2005 Harvard study that demonstrated former foster youth were nearly twice as likely to develop PTSD as veterans returning from tours in Iraq.
Why This Magazine is Particularly Important
It’s great to support and be featured in such a fantastic magazine like Foster Focus Magazine that highlight important issues in the foster care community. Chris Chmielewski, the creator of the magazine, is a kid from foster care himself, which gives him a unique perspective of being in the foster care system, it’s problems, and how we can fight to make it better.
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