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There was another warning [br]about cocaine today.

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Crack now has spread through [br]almost every American city.

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It is a problem in Houston, Philadelphia, [br]Kansas City, Tucson, and Sacramento.

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In the 1980s, the media sounded the alarm

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that a new drug, crack cocaine, [br]was taking over American cities

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and that it had an especially devastating [br]effect

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on pregnant women and their newborns.

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A new study says that babies born to women[br]who use cocaine during pregnancy

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are three times as likely to be born [br]with birth defects.

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They tend to be, what we call jittery.

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There are very very high risk [br]for Cerebral Palsy... Mental retardation.

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They are prone to hypertension, strokes, [br]and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

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These children were the most expensive [br]babies ever born in America.

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are going to overwhelm every social [br]service delivery system

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that they come in contact with[br]throughout the rest of their lives.

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Drugs take away the dream from [br]every child's heart,

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and replaces it with a nightmare.

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But were these infants really doomed?

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Nearly three decades later, what is [br]the true legacy of the crack baby era?

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♪ (music) ♪

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In the early 1980s, Dr. Ira Chaznoff, [br]a young researcher

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at North Western Memorial Hospital[br]in Chicago

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decided to study what [br]he saw as a worrisome trend

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among his pregnant patients, [br]who had used cocaine.

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Women were coming in and their babies [br]were looking different when they were born

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they had higher rates of pre-maturity.

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And, they had higher rates of newborn [br]seizures and other complications.

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A lot of the babies exposed to the cocaine[br]are quite small.

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We think that that's related to the use [br]of this drug during pregnancy.

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We'd seen effects of alcohol and other [br]substances on children

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so we were certainly open to the idea [br]that this was a problem.

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Cocaine was an epidemic.

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I think that it was something [br]that the media --

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It became an exciting thing to talk about.

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What you got? What you need? What you got?

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We call our broadcast, "48 Hours [br]on Crack Street".

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Soon after our paper was published, within[br]days we were getting calls from media

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all over the country

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and started hearing the term [br]"crack babies".

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Spotlight tonight, our investigative [br]series on cocaine kids.

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Despite all the warnings a growing number [br]of babies are being born

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already addicted to cocaine.

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As it got out into the world, [br]it became this phenomenon.

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Twenty three babies were born [br]to the cocaine using women in this study.

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Because the problem has appeared [br]so suddenly,

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there are few reliable statistics.

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The number of so called cocaine babies, [br]is growing at an astonishing rate.

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The number of babies born addicted [br]has risen more than 500%.

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I had lots of people interviewing me.

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Dr. Ira Chaznoff, of Chicago's [br]North Western Memorial Hospital

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runs the oldest program researching [br]cocaine and the newborn.

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It appears that cocaine has just [br]as devastating effect on pregnancy,

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and the new born, as heroin.

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Chaznoff told reporters that cocaine [br]exposure was causing some babies

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to be born with brain damage.

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And that others were overwhelmed by even [br]simple eye contact with the mother.

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These children are not normal [br]in the sense that

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they are going to be able[br]to enter the classic school room[br]

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and function in large groups of children.

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Other researchers and doctors echo [br]Chaznoff's conclusions

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and a host of seemingly recognizable[br]symptoms took hold.

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One of the things that we see about [br]babies who have been exposed to cocaine

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is they tend to be very tremulous [br]and shaky.

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Very fine kinds of tremors.

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We look to see if we would find [br]the effects that were reported.

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And we were saying, [br]"Well...we aren't seeing this."

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As Chaznoff's star rose, Dr. Clair Kholes [br]was reaching a different

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though equally startling conclusion [br]about crack babies

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based on her study of infant behavior [br]at Emory University.

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The effects didn't seem consistent [br]with the action of the drug itself.

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Many of the children, who are [br]the so-called classic cocaine babies,

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were premature babies.

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And the symptoms that were seen [br]on the videos, on television.

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the tremoring arms and all of that, [br]that was prematurity.

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You could have taken any premature baby [br]and gotten the same image.

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I think that people got very focused [br]on cocaine is the cause of this

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rather than thinking, substance abuse [br]is the cause of this,

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maternal lifestyle is the cause of this,

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social issues are the cause of this.

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But Khole's findings didn't fit within [br]the narrative of what had become

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a national scare.

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Cocaine.. Crack.

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If you use drugs while you are pregnant, [br]your baby can die.

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There's a whole lot of people

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who feel that if you can just scare people[br]sufficiently about something

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that that's better than actually telling [br]them the truth about something

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because that'll prevent them [br]from doing bad things.

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♪ (music playing) ♪

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(door crashing) Police!

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The American Agenda tonight [br]poses this question:

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What would you do about pregnant women [br]who use drugs

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and pass those drugs on to their babies?

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By the late 1980s, Chaznoff's findings [br]were being used to justify cases

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charging pregnant cocaine users as child[br]abusers, drug dealers, and killers.

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I was at first stunned.

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And then angry, that they would [br]distort the information.

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That's when I started realizing how [br]a lot of this can be taken out of context

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and used to bolster any kind of argument.

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People may have felt that [br]they were doing the right thing.

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But I mean the idea that one [br]would prosecute a pregnant women

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and use this kind of, [br]not very accurate research,

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to do so is very disturbing.

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♪ (music playing) ♪

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As the prosecutions continued, [br]crack babies grew to toddlers.

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No one knows how many there are,

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or even how to best identify them.

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But educators suspect that tens [br]of thousands of crack kids

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are in kindergartens in inner cities [br]in suburbia, even in small town America.

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It now threatens to create an entirely [br]new underclass of children,

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unable to care for themselves, [br]of infants born to suffer.

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♪ (music playing) ♪

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In the United States this year, [br]at least a hundred thousand crack babies

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will be born.

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Today the government said it will cost [br]5 billion dollars a year

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to care for such babies.

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And money doesn't begin [br]to tell the whole story.

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I'm supposed to be a victim [br]of that crack era.

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I was supposed to be disruptive,[br]mentally unstable.

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I wasn't supposed to reach the point [br]where I am now.

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The initial hypothesis was [br]that drug abuse[br]

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will lead to huge physical deformities,

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huge mental deformities in children.

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And, you know, in myself, I didn't see [br]any of those things.

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So, it would be easy for me to believe [br]that, that science doesn't hold true.

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Almost three decades since Chaznoff's [br]initial research,

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which focused on just twenty three babies,

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long term studies have found only subtle [br]changes

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in the brains of cocaine exposed[br]research subjects like Stone.

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There is no particular evidence of [br]this social, emotional deficit.

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You're not seeing really broad scale [br]severe developmental problems

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as was predicted.

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The schools have not been overwhelmed [br]by the flood of cocaine exposed children.

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In fact, Stone became the first in her [br]family to graduate from college.

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In learning that I had been exposed, [br]I kinda told myself

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I am not going to make this an issue.

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Whatever I have to do to get around [br]what the effects may be, I'll do that.

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The paper was a very preliminary[br]kind of finding.

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And it really shouldn't have been [br]generalized, to the extent it was.

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Which I believe Dr. Chaznoff eventually [br]came to himself and said

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that he felt that this didn't really [br]represent the whole of the situation.

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Doctor let's go to you on this question.

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You've studied this, perhaps [br]one of the first people to study this.

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How does cocaine use effect newborns?

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Well there's no questions that cocaine [br]use during pregnancy

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has some real effects on the unborn, [br]and on the newborn child.

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But, these effects are not devastating,

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and can be addressed through treatment [br]for the pregnant woman and for the child.

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Over time, Chaznoff did distance himself

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from some of the extreme pronouncements [br]he was quoted as making in the early days.

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I probably talked too much, [br]or gave long winded explanations.

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Which were completely cut out.

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It was one of those feelings where [br]you just feel completely out of control.

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But the hysteria that followed his initial[br]research had already taken its toll.

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It wasn't even a natural [br]disaster or a war.

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It was a drug that caused so much harm

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among my generation and my parent's[br]generation.

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Certainly cocaine was contributing [br]to this problem,

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but, they got very focused on it [br]as the only sole cause of it.

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I think people still believe [br]the cocaine story,

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but alcohol is much more [br]of a problem than cocaine.

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Because there is much more alcohol used [br]and it has much more severe effects.

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I think if you'd say something three times[br]out loud, people take it as fact.

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And also, I think there are certain [br]ideas that people want to believe.

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That really fit in with [br]cultural stereotypes.

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It is hard to get rid of those.

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♪ (music playing) ♪