In this opinion piece for The Hill, Susan N. Dreyfus, president and CEO of the Alliance for Strong Families and Communities, calls on the U.S. government to provide support to the nation's child welfare system, "which has the critical responsibility of keeping our families strong and intact so that parents can care for their children safely at home."

The coronavirus pandemic and the new restrictions in place to limit the spread of the infection have presented several difficulties for foster families in California, including how to manage visits between foster children and their families.

This article from NPR accompanies a brief radio segment highlighting the difficulties faced by families with children in foster care during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly the suspension of in-person visits between parents and their children. 

"Hundreds of thousands of vulnerable U.S. children could face a heightened risk of abuse and neglect as coronavirus-related school closures keep them at home and away from the nation’s biggest group of hotline tipsters: educators," says this article from USA Today.

This article describes the different approaches taken by New York City and Los Angeles child welfare systems in light of the COVID-19 crisis.

New York City's child welfare agency is “'aggressively' hunting for space to house [foster] youth who are sick or who need to be moved away from ill caretakers," according to this article from the Chronicle of Social Change.

"Hundreds of millions of children around the world will likely face increasing threats to their safety and wellbeing – including mistreatment, gender-based violence, exploitation, social exclusion and separation from caregivers – because of actions taken to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic," said UNICEF in this 20 March press release.

In this segment for National Public Radio (NPR), a parent of a child in foster care and several child welfare professionals describe how they are navigating in-person visits, emergency removals and foster placements in the time of the COVD-19 pandemic.

This article from the Chronicle of Social Change offers suggestions for how children in foster care can remain connected with their families during the COVID-19 pandemic when social distancing is required and in-person meetings are not safe to conduct.

"UN human rights experts have appealed to States to boost child protection measures to help safeguard the welfare of millions of children worldwide who may be more exposed to violence, sale, trafficking, sexual abuse and exploitation during the COVID-19 pandemic," says this press release from the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights.