A record number of kids in Washington’s child welfare system overdosed on fentanyl in 2022, including infants and toddlers

A record 56 children in Washington state’s foster care and child welfare system died or nearly died in 2022 after ingesting illegal drugs, including the ultra-potent synthetic opioid fentanyl.

The total number of children under the state’s care who ingested a drug either accidentally or intentionally in 2022 was about equal to the total from 2019 through 2021 combined, according to a report from Washington State’s Office of the Family and Children’s Ombud’s (OFCO).

The department receives its data from Washington’s Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF), which notifies OFCO when a critical incident occurs. These include children fatalities and near fatalities. 

Roughly 38 of the instances recorded in 2022 involved fentanyl, by far the biggest driver of opioid overdose deaths in Washington and the United States at large.

Instances of accidental drug poisoning involving children is hardly confined to Washington state. In 2021, more than 100 infants and children died from accidental fentanyl poisoning in the US, up six-fold from 2018.

In Washington, more than 8,000 children rely on the welfare system, including foster care, yet the latest report from the Washington State Department of Children, Youth, and Families detailing the health and safety of children in its care suggests more could be done to keep them safe.

The state foster care system, which cares for more than 8,000 children, aims to help children thrive ‘physically, emotionally and academically, nurtured by family and community.’

The application process to be a foster parent is comprehensive and includes at least  one training session in child-rearing tools such as behavior management and trauma-informed care. 

The latter is particularly important given many children enter foster care after being removed from high-risk homes. 

In about 36 percent of cases, a child is removed from their home and placed in foster care as a result of a parents substance misuse. 

In fact, the number of cases of children entering the foster care system due to parental drug use has more than doubled since 2000.

The application process also includes a home visit, during which an agent of the state inspects the home in person, meets the prospective foster family, and makes sure the environment is stable and nurturing. 

The process culminates in the foster family receiving a license to act in the state’s place and take care of a child in need.

However, the state-issued report, which detailed the number and situation of overdoses and accidental poisonings among Washington kids in foster care or who had received services from the state’s child welfare system, hints at flaws in a system meant to protect vulnerable children after they have been placed with a licensed family.

Of the 85 child deaths and 62 near-deaths recorded in Washington’s welfare system from January 2022 to December 2022, 34 near-deaths and 22 deaths were due to accidental drug poisonings and overdoses.

Sixty-seven percent of those total instances involved fentanyl. Twenty-four of the children were 11 years old or younger, and an even larger proportion of poisonings among this age group were caused by fentanyl – 79 percent.

Nine of the accidental ingestions and overdoses were in infants while another 14 were toddlers. The report did not say how many overdoses were fatal and how many were prevented using an overdose reversal drug.

The problem in Washington’s system has grown steadily worse over the years. The 2022 total of 56 accidental drug consumptions and overdose is up from 32 in 2021, and again from 13 in 2020.

DailyMail.com reached out to OFCO but the department has not returned our request for comment. 

In addition to requiring a license and home visits before allowing a family to take a child in, the state performs yearly wellness check-ins on children in their foster family’s homes.

But the state is only required to check in on a random sample of at least 10 percent of homes. In 2022, they checked in on just over 13 percent of households, and the annual rate hovered between 11 and 12 percent on average.

The report concluded with a litany of recommendations to bolster worker training to better spot and address fentanyl overdoses as they happen as well as situations in which a child may be abused or neglected.

The OFCO already runs a program that distributes medication lockboxes to families to safely store their medication, but it does not provide families with the lifesaving overdose antidote Naloxone, which typically costs between $35 and $65.

The rate of accidental fentanyl poisoning in Washington’s welfare system is increasing alongside those rates in the greater state of Washington as well as the country overall.

In Washington, 65 percent of fatal drug overdoses in 2022 were caused by a synthetic opioid, mostly fentanyl, according to data from the University of Washington’s Addiction, Drugs and Alcohol Institute.

That was a considerable increase from 2021, when fentanyl accounted for around 50 percent of overdose deaths. Just seven years ago it was eight percent.

Deaths involving synthetic opioids nationwide have risen consistently since 2016, a time when fentanyl was first showing signs of polluting the illicit drug supply, typically heroin, on a large scale.

Since then it has ravaged large swathes of big cities like Philadelphia and San Francisco to sprawling rural communities.

Of more than 107,000 fatal drug overdoses in 2022, an estimated 68 percent, more than 72,000, involved a synthetic opioid such as fentanyl. That’s about 199 people on average dying every day.