The Mission of the American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) is to produce and disseminate ethically and scientifically sound policy to health care professionals, parents, policy makers, and society that promotes the optimal physical and emotional health and well-being of children.

ACPeds envisions a society where all children, from the moment of their conception, are valued unselfishly, and where the two-parent, father-mother nuclear family is honored and supported as the optimal setting for child development. We encourage parents to advance the needs of their children above their own, and to be ethical and responsible role models in the context of marriage.

Children are the future of our nation and society. As such, they deserve to be valued and parented in the best possible family environment; supported by physicians of integrity committed to respecting and protecting children’s inherent dignity and promoting their optimal health and well-being. The College further recognizes the rights and responsibilities of parents to direct the health care and upbringing of their children, and the right of conscience of health care professionals in providing optimal health care.

The Objectives of ACPeds are:

1. To foster and stimulate optimal health care for the pre-born, infants, children, and adolescents;
2. To promote the basic father-mother, nuclear family unit, within the context of marriage as the optimal setting for child development, while pledging to support all children, regardless of their circumstances;
3. To advocate for children at all stages of development, from conception to young adulthood;
4. To cultivate and encourage parental responsibility for and involvement in the child’s life;
5. To affirm that parents have the inalienable right and responsibility to educate and rear their children;
6. To affirm biological integrity of male and female sexes in the care and counsel of children and adolescents;
7. To promote sexual abstinence among youth until marriage;
8. To defend the freedom of conscience of health care professionals in their care of the pre-born, infants, children and adolescents;
9. To encourage and support sound, ethical scientific research and its interpretation, free from political or commercial bias, in pediatric medicine;
10. To apply to the practice of pediatric health care the Hippocratic concept that persons from conception to natural death have inherent dignity and equal inestimable value precluding interventions with intent to kill rather than heal or comfort; and
11. To build coalitions with other organizations that share the Mission, Values and Vision of the College.

ACPeds:

1. Recognizes that there are absolutes and scientific truths that transcend relative social considerations of the day.
2. Recognizes that good medical science cannot exist in a moral vacuum and pledges to promote such science.
3. Recognizes the fundamental mother-father family unit, within the context of marriage, to be the optimal setting for the development and nurturing of children and pledges to promote this unit.
4. Recognizes the unique value of every human life from the time of conception to natural death and pledges to promote research and clinical practice that provides for the healthiest outcome of the child from conception to adulthood.
5. Recognizes the essential role parents play in encouraging and correcting the child and pledges to protect and promote this role.
6. Recognizes the physical and emotional benefits of sexual abstinence until marriage and pledges to promote this behavior as the ideal for adolescence.
7. Recognizes that health professionals caring for children must maintain high ethical and scientific standards and pledges to promote such practice.

ACPeds is a national organization of pediatricians and other health care professionals dedicated to the health and well-being of children. It was founded by a group of concerned physicians who saw the need for a pediatric organization that bases its policies and positions upon scientific truth within a framework of ethical absolutes.

Of particular importance to the founders were (as it is today) the sanctity of human life from conception to natural death and the importance of the fundamental mother-father family unit in the rearing of children.

The first official meeting of the newly formed college was held in Boston in October 2002. ACPeds is committed to fulfilling its mission by producing sound policy, based upon the best available research, to assist parents and to influence society in the endeavor of childrearing.

Membership is open to qualifying health care professionals who share in the mission, vision, and values of ACPeds.

ACPeds currently has members in 47 states, and several countries outside of the US. The ACPeds is a not-for-profit corporation organized for scientific and educational purposes, exempt from taxation under Section 501(c)(3) of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. The home office is in Atlanta, Georgia.