NYT: 42% of children who survived Katrina have respiratory problems- many lack even minimal stability in lives, school problems rampant

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http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/05/us/05trailer.html

* " The health problems of Hurricane Katrina children are daunting. When the

Children's Health Fund, whose mobile health clinics have provided the only

doctors and psychologists available to many of these families, reviewed the

charts of children seen this year, researchers with the Mailman School of

Public Health at Columbia University found that 41 percent under age 4 had

iron-deficiency anemia — twice the rate for children in New York City's

homeless shelters. Anemia, often attributable to poor nutrition, is

associated with developmental problems and academic underachievement.

Forty-two percent of the children, who lived in trailers laced with

dangerous levels of formaldehyde, had allergic rhinitis or an upper

respiratory infection, the study found.

More than half of those ages 6 to 11 had a behavior or learning problem, yet

in the East Baton Rouge School District children can wait for as long as two

years to be tested for learning disabilities.

" Not only has their health not improved since the storm, " the study said,

" over time it has declined to an alarming level. "

Medical care, counseling and child care are hard to find. In that respect,

LaTonya London has been lucky. Her youngest children, born while the family

lived at Renaissance Village, have two of the 16 Early Head Start slots —

down from 200 right after the storm — reserved for evacuees of Hurricane

Katrina in Baton Rouge. The baby, Edbony, was born with no forearms. Darren,

2, was two months premature and suffers from asthma and delayed speech.

The eldest of Ms. London's five children, Darrell, 7, has developed behavior

problems so serious that he has already been suspended several times from

first grade, causing Ms. London to abandon plans to start vocational

training, she said. In response, she has resumed counseling sessions for

Darrell at the mobile clinic.

Dr. Irwin Redlener, the director of the Children's Health Fund, notes that

there is as yet no comprehensive method of tracking these children, who are

supposed to be the subject of a long-term study by the Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention. " *