Last week, a city in southern Japan opened what can only be described as a mail box for babies. It is similar to our ‘safe haven’ laws, where a parent can drop a baby off at a hospital. . .no questions asked. The purpose of safe haven laws in the United States is to deter pregnant mothers from abandoning their babies in unsuitable conditions. At least if they’re dropped off at the hospital, they have a chance at life.
In Japan, the purpose of the baby mail box is similar although a little different. Japanese health officials actually want to increase the birth rate (which is very, very low) and decrease the rate of abortion which is widely accepted there. By offering mothers another alternative than actually caring for their baby, they are hoping that less mothers will turn to abortion for unwanted pregnancies.
The drop off spot looks somewhat like a mailbox. There is a sign above it asking parents to please leave something with the baby. When the door is opened, a message over the intercom encourages parents to come in and talk with hospital staff and an alarm lets a nurse know that a baby has been dropped off.
It has been hotly debated and the conservative Japanese government does not condone it. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has very publicly condemned the baby mail box saying that parents are responsible for caring for their children and abandoning your child is unacceptable under any circumstances. He has gone further to say that the government takes responsibility for helping its parents raise their children. However, in the end, the mail box was approved because there were no legal grounds to oppose it.
I wonder if that will change now though. The baby mail box received its first baby this week. . .only this wasn’t a baby at all but a three year old little boy. The little boy told hospital staff that ‘he came with daddy.’
I think safe haven laws are good and although the idea of a baby mail box seems a little strange to me, I suppose it is equivalent. What I can’t get over is how little human life is valued. I am sure there are mothers that agonize over leaving their children–I recognize that. But why it’s deplorable to leave a baby in a mail box but it’s acceptable to abort it–I will never understand. In a culture that so readily accepts abortion as ‘normal’, is abandoning your infant (or even toddler) really that far of a step beyond abortion? It would seem to follow the same line of logic–simply the next step.
Hopefully, the Japanese baby mail box will see no more toddlers and will be able to actively serve the purpose for which it was created.