Is there a worldwide 'childcare crisis'?

Kimberly Ells

September 24, 2024 6 Reactions

Erica Komisar, a child development expert with over 25 years in practice, said in 2023, “Institutional care is not and never will be a good option for children under the age of three. There are so many studies which link institutional care from zero to three with increased cortisol stress hormone levels, behavioral issues, anxiety, and increased aggression.”

Komisar advises, “Turn to kinship bonds first. Turn to family members who have a similar investment in your child as you do and who will be in your child’s life going forward. For instance, an aunt or a grandmother or a sister.”

She says that a single, consistent surrogate caregiver or nanny, which can be shared with another family, “is still a better option than daycare, which is my least favourite option because of the ratio of caregiver to child.”

Komisar explains that turnover in daycare workers is extremely high, and that level of instability isn’t optimal for children. She says,

“Babies need quiet, calm, peaceful, playful, secure environments. I can’t emphasize enough that daycare is not that.”

Similarly, Jenet Erickson, a research fellow at the Institute for Family Studies focusing on maternal and child well-being, says,

“Children are ‘hardwired’ to develop within a small group of familiar people and require one-on-one nurturing relationships to develop well… The much bigger groups and more chaotic conditions characteristic of child care settings compared to home and family environments may cause elevated stress levels among some children… Persistently elevated stress during early childhood has been established as a risk factor for adverse developmental outcomes.”

Erickson highlights a longitudinal study demonstrating that while spending time in institutionalised daycare may not be problematic for every child, there were correlations between time spent in institutionalised care and child outcomes:

“By age four-and-a-half, children who had spent more than 30 hours per week in child care had, on average, worse outcomes in every area of social-emotional development — weaker social competence, more behavior problems, and greater conflict with adults — at rates three times higher than their peers.”

So, it appears that the very things being decried as “suboptimal” childcare solutions — utilising family members, sharing hired nannies, and adjusting parents’ work schedules to maximise time at home — are the very things that experts and data suggest are the best for children.

Dr Stanley Greenspan, a renowned child psychiatrist, agrees. He says, “The only way for daycare to be improved is for fewer people to use it.” So, according to the experts, the problem may not be that too few children are in institutionalised care, but too many.

Komisar has deftly identified the real crisis. She says, “The effects of maternal absence on our children is a major social issue of our time.” So perhaps the more significant emergency is the diminishing influence of mothers and the catastrophic effects it is having on their children, their posterity, and the world.

What do you think of these findings? Leave a comment below.

Kimberly Ells is the author of The Invincible Family. Follow her at Invincible Family Substack.

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