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COVID-19 and the Urgency of Parentage Reform

Abstract

This Article, written for a symposium at Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law, highlights how the COVID-19 pandemic underscores the urgent need to reform outdated parentage laws. It uses Pennsylvania law—the home state of the Kline School of Law—to illustrate how LGBTQ families can be harmed when parentage laws fail to reflect the reality of family life and form today. While LGBTQ-parent families long have contended with laws that failed to contemplate and protect their families, the COVID-19 pandemic has heightened the challenges and stresses they face. The Article closes by describing and elaborating on one reform model—the Uniform Parentage Act of 2017—available to states to guard against these harms.