Japan's first 'baby hatch' has labour pain

TOKYO: Plans for Japan's first "baby hatch," where parents can drop off unwanted infants anonymously, are suffering labour pains as the country struggles with its declining birth rate. 

Ministers of the conservative government are in a dilemma as they have found no legal reason to block the plan, which advocates say can help boost the number of births here, but are concerned about the moral implications of it. 

A Roman Catholic hospital in Kumamoto, a provincial city in southern Japan, applied in December for official approval of the system modeled on the "Babyklappe" in Germany.

The system, said to be common in medieval times, was revived in 1996 by a Christian group in Germany, where there are reportedly now about 80 hatches. 

The baby hatch at the Jikei Hospital in Kumamoto would be called "the cradle of storks" and set up in the lobby like a post box, according to hospital officials.

The cradle is equipped with a warmer and an alarm that goes off when a baby is deposited.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who has campaigned for Japan to return to "family values," late on Friday lashed out at the idea.

"I feel very strong resistance to setting up a facility that allows people to leave children anonymously," Abe told reporters.

"Basically, there are already facilities which deal with such children," Abe said. "I think it is important that people know the responsibility of becoming parents when they give birth."

But advocates say the baby hatch, if it becomes a trend, could help boost the birth rate in Japan, where abortion is widely accepted and adoption outside of extended families is rare.

Japan's population has been sinking since 2005 as more young people choose to put off marriage. Out-of-wedlock births are mostly taboo in Japan.

Yukiko Tajiri, the chief nurse at Jikei hospital, says the Catholic facility has counselled some 160 unmarried pregnant women in the past four years, arranging for many of them to find foster parents.

The baby hatch would be more effective, Tajiri said.

"Since the announcement of the plan, we have helped five women who couldn't afford to become single mothers and were on the verge of aborting their babies as they had nowhere else to go," she said.

"We have been providing help with much frustration. But if the plan is officially approved, we will be happy as we can work with a calm state of mind."

The hospital needs approval by the Kumamoto municipal government, which in turn has asked Tokyo for advice.

Despite Abe's opposition, officials acknowledged they had few legal grounds on which to block the plan.

"When I am asked if there are any legal problems about the plan, I must say none," Hakuo Yanagisawa, the health and welfare minister, told a news conference on Friday. 

"On one hand, it will help little lives go on without being lost unnecessarily," he said, in apparent reference to infanticide or abortion.

"But, on the other hand, it is feared to encourage parents to entrust children to others. It is a very difficult problem."

Yanagisawa recently came under fire for comparing women to "child-bearing machines" and urging them to "do their best per capita" to help reverse Japan's slipping birth rate.

In 1955, abortions nearly matched the number of live births in Japan but the rate has been gradually going down, in particular since 1999 when Japan became the last major developed country to allow birth control pills.

The number of abortions now hovers around 21 percent of pregnancies, in line with Western countries.

Sanae Takaichi, the minister charged with finding ways to boost the population, is a sworn foe of abortion and has opposed the baby hatch.

"It is useless if it results in promoting irresponsible abandonment of children," she said.