By Jim Brown
January 28, 2003

(AgapePress) - A conservative author and researcher says by sending your child to daycare, you may be impairing their physical, emotional, and intellectual development.

An ongoing government study has already shown that there are serious detrimental effects of non-parental care for children -- especially those in daycare centers where the ratio of care givers to children is not all that high.

Brian Robertson is managing editor of a new publication called Family Policy Review. He says parents need to be aware of the health risks associated with daycare.

"The literature of pediatricians and medical experts has for years been warning about the fact that daycare centers are among the worst places in our society for the transmission of infectious disease," he says, "and that ranges from things like inner-ear infections, which can lead to other things, to much more serious things."

Robertson also says children in non-maternal care are more likely to be aggressive, non-compliant, and even violent. He says the primary bond a child forms with their care-giver is all-important to that young person's emotional development.

"It's usually called 'attachment theory' in popular discourse," he explains. "That attachment the child forms with the primary care-giver is the basis of all future emotional development and all relationships that he or she will form in [his or her life] in the future."

Robertson says because daycare is a low-wage industry with a high turnover rate, it fails to provide the stability children need.

According to Robertson, an incident in North Carolina is just another example of how children in day care suffer. A Durham daycare center was recently shut down after the owner spiked a four-month-old girl's pacifier and five-month-old boy's bottle with adult cold medicine, and shook and slapped a two-year-old boy.

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