![]() That's what can happen to people like them in Maryland. They have done nothing they just have IQs of less than 70. They have been placed here by their parents or the state. Robert Cooke: Well if the parents gave up the child and the state assumed custody, then the state would place that baby in some kind of a foster home if there was any available and… or in an institution, which I think is the alternative that many parents would think of, and they might think that it would be better if the baby died than go into a terrible institution.Ĭlare Crawford: These people are inmates, not patients. ![]() So I can be sympathetic with such a family, even if I wouldn't agree with what was done.Ĭlare Crawford: What were the parents' alternatives, besides letting it die?ĭr. And I think a mother right after the birth of a child is frequently not in a very good position to make a decision in a very rational way. There are great expectations that people have for their children, and when one is abnormal, this is a great disappointment. There are stigmas still in our society to having a handicapped child. Robert Cooke: I think the birth of a handicapped child such as a mongoloid infant is really a terribly difficult experience for any family to accept. He discussed his feelings with reporter Clare Crawford, who then went to Rosewood State Hospital for the Retarded to see what alternatives exist for parents who cannot afford private care for retarded children. Robert Cooke, Head of Pediatrics at Johns Hopkins. It was an agonizing time for the parents and the pediatrician, Dr. Perhaps they simply could not tolerate a life with a baby which was less than what society has determined is normal. The parents refused to permit doctors to remove an obstruction from the infant's stomach and permitted the baby to starve to death. The story actually began with a recent birth of a mongoloid baby at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Much of what will be shown is ugly and shocking. Segments of the program were shown earlier this month on News 4 Washington. That is the subject of tonight's report, a study of what the state of Maryland provides the mentally retarded. ![]() The retarded have committed no crime, but the stigma of being less than perfect often sentences them to live in conditions worse than those in many prisons. More than 200,000 live in public institutions. Three out of every 100 Americans are mentally retarded, that's six million people, and it is estimated that another four million will be born before the turn of the century. Jim Vance: …nation in the world because the gap between what we know about care for the retarded and what is actually being done is increasing at a rapid rate. ![]()
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