A NATIONAL survey of child-care licensing requirements conducted by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the American Public Health Association (APHA) has found that critical health and safety regulations in many states are "inadequate, vague, or nonexistent."
Speaking at a press conference at the AAP's annual meeting in Chicago, Ill, George G. Sterne, MD, cochair of the National Health and Safety Standards for Child Care Project, discussed the findings of this survey and announced that next fall the AAP and the APHA will publish guidelines for the provision of quality child care in out-of-home settings. Sterne, who is clinical professor of pediatrics at Tulane University School of Medicine, New Orleans, La, says the standards are not intended to serve as regulations, but rather as a reference for states to develop their own child-care licensing laws.
The AAP-APHA survey evaluated child-care licensing requirements in every state and in eight major