New China regs in a nutshell from IAAP:


1. The adopters must be a male and female couple with a stable marriage. If this is the first marriage for the couple they must have been married two years before submitting a dossier. If the husband or wife has been divorced they must now have been married for at least 5 years. They can have no more than two divorces.

2. Both Husband and wife must be at least 30 years old and under the age of 50. For parents adopting special needs children they must both be at lease 30 years old and both must also be under 55.

3. Both parents must be physically and mentally healthy and have none of the following conditions:

A. AIDS

B. Mental Handicap

C. Infectious disease in the infectious stage

D. Binocular blind or binocular parallax or monocular blind and with no ocular prosthesis.

E. Binaural hearing loss or language function loss (Adoption of special needs children who have identical conditions will be exempt from this limitation.)

F. Dysfunction of limbs or trunk caused by impairment, incompleteness, numbness or deformation; severe facial deformity).

G. Severe disease that will require long term treatment and which will affect life expectancy such as malignant tumor, lupus erythematosus, epilepsy, etc.

H. Post surgery of major organ transplantation within the last 10 years.

I. Schizophrenia

J. Medication for severe mental disorders such as depression, mania, anxiety neurosis, etc., with in the last two years.

K. BMI (Body mass index) greater than or equal to 40.

4. Either the husband or the wife must have a stable job. The family’s annual income must be at least $10,000 per family member including the prospective adoptee and they shall have a net worth of at least $80,000. The family annual income may not include welfare income, life relief fund, pension, unemployment insurance, or government subsidy, etc.

5. Both husband and wife must have reached the education level of a senior in high school or vocational training of the same level.

6. The number of children in the family under the age of 18 years shall be less than five and the youngest shall have reached the age of 1 year. Adoption of special needs will be exempt from the family size requirement.

7. Husband and wife shall never have come under any criminal sanction. They shall have no history of domestic violence, sex abuse, and no abandonment or abuse of children. They shall have no history of taking illegal drugs. They shall have no history of taking medication for a mental illness. They shall have no history of alcohol abuse for the last ten years.

Adoption applicants shall be judged on a case by case basis when either husband or wife has less than 3 criminal records of slight severity with no severe outcomes longer than 10 years ago, or has less than 5 records of traffic law violations with no severe outcomes.

Dick Graham emphasizes:

The CCAA has not been clear on exactly how these new regulations will apply to special needs adoptions. We have been told unofficially that they will examine each special needs case on a case by case basis. If you do not exactly fit all the new regulations give us a call and we can discuss your particular case with you.

Change in Special Needs Processing:

Without warning to anyone the CCAA has added an extra step in the Special Needs paperwork. The CCAA had been issuing the TA about two to three months after your log in date (LID). However on January 10, we received what is called the "Letter of Seeking Confirmation From Adopter". This is the letter that is typically sent to families adopting non- special needs children along with the referral information. We have confirmed that the CCAA now wants all families adopting SN children to also sign this before receiving the travel approval (TA). After the CCAA receives the signed Confirmation Letter they will issue the TA. What this means for special needs families is a longer wait for their TA. It will probably take about 3 to 4 weeks between the Confirmation Letter and the TA.

If you'd like to calculate your Body Mass Index (BMI) here is the calculator from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the NIH, and here is the US State Department's page on adoption from China.