German 'Baby Drop' Gets First Customer

July 5 -- Germany’s controversial “baby bank” — a drop slot for unwanted infants — has announced its first successful adoption.

A baby girl left anonymously two months ago at a Hamburg clinic is well and living with her adoptive parents.

When the program for unwanted babies was launched in April, critics blasted it as an abomination — a recycling center creating disposable children for the disposable society.

Proponents argued the “baby bank” offers troubled mothers a safe place to leave unwanted babies that may otherwise be abandoned or even killed. They feel vindicated by the successful rescue of the program’s first foundling.

How It Works

A mother can approach the drop-slot without being watched by cameras, pull down the waist-high metal door, slip her infant into a baby carrier, close the door and walk away.

A silent alarm sounds, a camera watching the carrier turns on, and the baby is monitored until a nurse arrives.

The program, “Operation Foundling,” was launched in Hamburg with the intent of reducing the growing number of abandoned babies.

In Germany, the number of newborn babies found dumped in trash bins and cardboard boxes, left to die by desperate or disturbed mothers, has been growing.

First Foundling

The first “baby-drop” infant was slipped into the slot in May. The alarm went off and a medical worker recovered her in seven minutes.

Doctors say the baby girl was born about three weeks prematurely and the mother apparently had cut the umbilical cord herself, tying it with just a string.

The organization waited to announce the baby’s arrival because under German law, the mother had eight weeks to reconsider and reclaim the child.