Connecticut adoptee urges support for state law giving him access to his original birth certificate

Editor's note: This is one in an ongoing series of posts spotlighting support for our continued effort to provide adult adoptees born in Connecticut access to their original birth certificates. The testimony featured in this series was submitted to the state Legislature earlier this year in support of proposed legislation that would have restored the right of adult adoptees adopted before Oct. 1, 1983, to access their original birth certificate. (Post-1983 adoptees had this right restored in 2014.) The letters are published with the authors' permission. Sign up for our newsletter at www.accessconnecticut.org if you want to help us end discrimination against adoptees.

I am writing to ask for your support of Senate Bill 977, An Act Concerning Access to Birth Certificates and Parental Health Information for Adoptive Persons. I was adopted and I know next to nothing about my biological parents due to the lack of access to my original birth certificate here in Connecticut. I have no family medical history with which to protect my health, or my children’s health. The only information I possess is the amended and false birth certificate created at the time of my adoption. I strongly believe that ALL adult adoptees should have access to their original birth certificates.

Thank you very much for your consideration.

Bill Wilkes