Foster Care and Child Maltreatment Mortality Rates in the US

Do state-level child mortality rates increase when foster care entry rates decrease?This cross-sectional study of 3.4 million records of children in state-supervised foster care found no evidence of a negative association between foster care entries and child maltreatment fatalities at the population level.Current evidence suggests that decreasing rates of foster care entry are not associated with changes in child maltreatment mortality rates.

Corresponding Author: Frank Edwards, PhD, School of Criminal Justice, Rutgers University–Newark, 123 Washington St, Ste 579B, Newark, NJ 07102 (frank.edwards@rutgers.edu).

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