Despite a reversal of the Trump administration family separation policy, as of July 2018, more than 2000 children remain separated from their parents or legal guardians.1
In an article published in JAMA, Howard A. Zucker, MD, JD, and Danielle Greene, DrPH, of the New York State Department of Health, suggest that child-parent separation during an already tumultuous and emotionally strenuous event may exert greater long-term physical and mental health effects on children than is currently being discussed.2
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have been consistently associated with adverse health effects throughout life. Child-parent separation represents at least 4 of the 10 ACE categories, including parental incarceration, emotional neglect, parental separation, and witnessing violence. In addition, pre-existing adverse experiences that catapulted the families' into deciding to cross the border, including violence experienced in their home countries, add to the additional ACEs experienced by the detained children.
[For more on this story by Brandon May, go to https://www.medicalbag.com/pol...licy/article/792195/]
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