A Republican senator claims that the Arizona Department of Child Safety has “lost” more than 550 children, but data reported on a monthly basis by the child welfare agency shows the actual number of missing children to be far lower. DCS spokeswoman Cynthia Weiss told the Mirror that agency staff met with Farnsworth Sept. 26 to explain its data to him. DCS’s most recent monthly operational and outcome report sets the number of children who are missing from state care at 43. Missing children are distinguished differently from runaways in agency data. Missing children are generally abducted from state care, most often by a parent or other family member.