[Nyororin]

Japan *doesn`t* have a high rate of abandonment. The point isn`t that it is so common they need to do something about it - the thinking is that even ONE child being neglected, abused, or abandoned is too many. I agree with that. It doesn`t need to be a big problem to start trying to get rid of.

Abortion is legal. I wouldn`t say it`s encouraged, but it is legal.
HOWEVER, giving up a child for adoption pretty much isn`t. If you don`t want to kill the baby before birth, you`re stuck with it. Not everyone wants to get an abortion. When a child is older, you can go to a children`s home and ask them to care for your child for you, but you`re still partially responsible because you`re not giving the child up. After so many years of a child being in the home, I believe you can give up parental rights, but it takes a lot of time and paperwork, and sometimes you aren`t allowed.
Even before that stage, it isn`t as if it`s easy to put a child into one of the homes in the first place - you have to go and have multiple interviews, and then they go around to family and ask about the situation, etc. The last thing most people want everyone around to know is that they can`t take care of their own child.

What ends up happening is that the unwanted children stay in neglectful or abusive homes, largely because the parents are too humiliated to admit there is a problem.

THAT is where this box comes in. Anonymous and fast, they can give the child away before it ever gets to that stage. Before things ever escalate to neglect of abuse.

Recently the body of a one year old boy was found at the side of the road. The mother had tried multiple times to get the children`s home to accept him but they were still in the interview-consideration phase... Apparently she couldn`t find anyone to watch him, and couldn`t carry him while riding on a motorcycle with the father, so they put him into the space under the seat. He suffocated.

If she`d been able to give him up, quickly and anonymously, when she had felt things were out of control... Or even in the beginning when she knew she wouldn`t be able to take care of him... He wouldn`t have died.

Either way, there is a lot of speculation going on that the 3 year old story is a fabrication. The hospital isn`t going to be telling anyone about it, but yet magically, that morning it seems that a certain newspaper (who was a strong opposer to the idea) came up with this story. It is TOO perfect in that it covers all the possible misuses in one neat package. An older child? Check. From out of town? Check. Tricked into getting in? Check. Given up by the father not the mother? Check.

Because they have sworn privacy related to all issues in regard to the box, the hospital HAS to continue to say no comment about it. Even confirming that it didn`t happen would be considered straying from the privacy policy... How does the newspaper know all this? A lot of Japanese people are really suspicious.