Abandoned Babies
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Baby abandoned on house doorstep
A newborn boy, with his umbilical cord cut and clamped, has been found outside a house in the West Midlands.
The house owner, in Tile Cross, Birmingham, called an ambulance after hearing the baby crying.
Paramedics said if it had happened later the owner would have been out and the baby exposed to the cold for hours.
The child was found lying on a concrete step and was cold but otherwise healthy. The baby has been taken to Heartlands Hospital in east Birmingham.
The man who found the baby, Robert Coughlan, 23, said he had been in the bath when he heard crying.
"I thought it was the television. But then I heard it again.
"I opened the front door and saw this little baby, he only looked a few hours old."
He told BBC News there was no knock on the door and there was no-one in the street.
"I don't know why they chose my house. I am the first one in the row so that may be it," he added.
While waiting for the emergency services he even changed the boy's nappy.
"I put him down on the floor so he was nice and warm and I put the fire on.
"He was smelling a bit so I changed his nappy. I had one lying around the house from when my nephew and niece are here."
An ambulance service spokeswoman said the fact the baby's cord had been clamped appears to show he was born with proper medical supervision.
The ambulance service was called to the house, in Rycroft Grove, shortly before 1100 BST on Monday.
"The baby boy was very cold having been lying on a concrete step, but he was very alert," emergency medical technician Steve Howard said.
The baby boy, thought to be hours old, had been left wearing an all-in-one babygrow.
Heartlands Hospital spokeswoman Lisa Dunn said: "The baby is doing well and is under the expert care of hospital staff."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west ... 044989.stm
A newborn boy, with his umbilical cord cut and clamped, has been found outside a house in the West Midlands.
The house owner, in Tile Cross, Birmingham, called an ambulance after hearing the baby crying.
Paramedics said if it had happened later the owner would have been out and the baby exposed to the cold for hours.
The child was found lying on a concrete step and was cold but otherwise healthy. The baby has been taken to Heartlands Hospital in east Birmingham.
The man who found the baby, Robert Coughlan, 23, said he had been in the bath when he heard crying.
"I thought it was the television. But then I heard it again.
"I opened the front door and saw this little baby, he only looked a few hours old."
He told BBC News there was no knock on the door and there was no-one in the street.
"I don't know why they chose my house. I am the first one in the row so that may be it," he added.
While waiting for the emergency services he even changed the boy's nappy.
"I put him down on the floor so he was nice and warm and I put the fire on.
"He was smelling a bit so I changed his nappy. I had one lying around the house from when my nephew and niece are here."
An ambulance service spokeswoman said the fact the baby's cord had been clamped appears to show he was born with proper medical supervision.
The ambulance service was called to the house, in Rycroft Grove, shortly before 1100 BST on Monday.
"The baby boy was very cold having been lying on a concrete step, but he was very alert," emergency medical technician Steve Howard said.
The baby boy, thought to be hours old, had been left wearing an all-in-one babygrow.
Heartlands Hospital spokeswoman Lisa Dunn said: "The baby is doing well and is under the expert care of hospital staff."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west ... 044989.stm
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This is a 'Baby born on plane' story with a sad difference:
NZ plane birth charges 'likely'
A woman who allegedly abandoned her baby after giving birth on a flight to Auckland from Samoa may face criminal charges, New Zealand police said.
"Police are currently investigating the mother's actions... A likelihood of this investigation is a criminal prosecution," a statement said.
Reports say the infant was discovered in an onboard toilet compartment as the new mother tried to leave the airport.
Police said the woman had since been reunited with her baby.
The child's gender has not been disclosed.
Immigration officials are examining information provided by the woman on her visa application and how she boarded the plane at such an advanced stage of pregnancy, said a spokesman for the Pacific Blue airline.
The woman, who is believed to be a 30-year-old Samoan, gave birth on board a flight from the Samoan capital Apia to Auckland on Thursday, the airline said.
Airport staff became suspicious when they noticed her blood-stained clothing as she tried to leave the airport in Auckland, according to local media reports.
The newborn was found shortly afterwards by an airline worker. One source said the baby was found in a toilet rubbish bin.
It was not immediately clear whether any of the 150 passengers or crew on the flight were aware that the woman was in labour.
Pacific Blue says passengers who are more than 36 weeks pregnant must have medical clearance to fly.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-p ... 954431.stm
NZ plane birth charges 'likely'
A woman who allegedly abandoned her baby after giving birth on a flight to Auckland from Samoa may face criminal charges, New Zealand police said.
"Police are currently investigating the mother's actions... A likelihood of this investigation is a criminal prosecution," a statement said.
Reports say the infant was discovered in an onboard toilet compartment as the new mother tried to leave the airport.
Police said the woman had since been reunited with her baby.
The child's gender has not been disclosed.
Immigration officials are examining information provided by the woman on her visa application and how she boarded the plane at such an advanced stage of pregnancy, said a spokesman for the Pacific Blue airline.
The woman, who is believed to be a 30-year-old Samoan, gave birth on board a flight from the Samoan capital Apia to Auckland on Thursday, the airline said.
Airport staff became suspicious when they noticed her blood-stained clothing as she tried to leave the airport in Auckland, according to local media reports.
The newborn was found shortly afterwards by an airline worker. One source said the baby was found in a toilet rubbish bin.
It was not immediately clear whether any of the 150 passengers or crew on the flight were aware that the woman was in labour.
Pacific Blue says passengers who are more than 36 weeks pregnant must have medical clearance to fly.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-p ... 954431.stm
ramonmercado
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los_grandes_lutz
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If that was a well known cheap UK airline, they'd be looking for the mother so that they could charge her the fare for the baby.
Seriously, I always find it very sad when mother are put in that situation. But as the baby has already had a bit of luck with a security guard noticing him, maybe he's got some more lucky breaks coming his way.
Seriously, I always find it very sad when mother are put in that situation. But as the baby has already had a bit of luck with a security guard noticing him, maybe he's got some more lucky breaks coming his way.
ramonmercado
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ramonmercado said:
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The 'baby box' returns to Europe
By Stephen Evans, BBC News, Berlin
Boxes where parents can leave an unwanted baby, common in medieval Europe, have been making a comeback over the last 10 years. Supporters say a heated box, monitored by nurses, is better for babies than abandonment on the street - but the UN says it violates the rights of the child.
It is an unlikely scene for the most painful of dramas. On the edge of a road in a leafy suburb of Berlin, there is a sign pointing through the trees down a path. It says "Babywiege" - Baby Cradle.
At the end of that path, there is a stainless steel hatch with a handle. Pull that hatch open, and there are neatly folded blankets for a baby. The warmth is safe and reassuring. There is a letter, too, telling you who to call if you change your mind.
About twice a year, someone - presumably a woman - treads that path at the secluded rear of Waldfriede Hospital and leaves the baby, perhaps born in secret only a few hours earlier.
That person - presumably the mother - then turns and walks away, never to see the baby again. The baby grows, but never gets to know who his or her mother was.
The word "presumably" is used because the process is secret and anonymous, so nobody knows who the people are who make that walk, carrying a baby to reverse their steps without one.
So one of the arguments made by those who condemn the system is that it may well be men who are giving the baby away, dumping him or her seems too hard a word. The critics say that baby boxes may be used by unscrupulous fathers or even controllers of prostitutes to put pressure on mothers to dispose of an unwanted baby.
The psychologist, Kevin Browne of Nottingham University told the BBC: "Studies in Hungary show that it's not necessarily mothers who place babies in these boxes - that it's relatives, pimps, step-fathers, fathers.
"Therefore, the big question is: are these baby boxes upholding women's rights, and has the mother of that child consented to the baby being placed in the baby box?"
Professor Browne continued: "The baby hatch is so anonymous, and so removed from the availability of counselling, that it creates a damage and a danger to the mother and child."
On this argument, by making it so easy to get rid of a baby, mothers are less likely to get the real help they need in their situation of great emotional trauma and even physical risk.
It is an argument the people who set up baby boxes reject. They say, rather, that they are offering desperate mothers a safe way to get rid of their unwanted babies. Those who don't walk the path to the baby box might instead leave the baby in the biting cold of a public place.
Or worse. A court case has just finished in Germany where a mother was prosecuted for killing her baby by throwing it from a fifth-floor balcony.
This kind of case is giving a push to the movement for more baby boxes across Central and Eastern Europe, from the Baltic states, down through Germany, Austria, Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, to Romania. The law in some countries encourages their spread - in Hungary, for example, it was changed so that leaving a baby in the official baby box was deemed to be a legal act amounting to consent to adoption, while dumping a child anywhere else remains a crime.
Professor Browne thinks that the spread is greatest in countries with a communist past (and so an attitude that the authorities will take over child-rearing) or in Catholic countries where the stigma of unmarried motherhood is stronger.
He did much of the unpublished research on which the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child relied in its assessment of the system. It believes that children have a right to know who their parents are and that right is denied to the foundlings left in baby boxes.
The proponents don't accept that for a moment. Gabriele Stangl, of Waldfriede Hospital in Berlin, said that baby boxes save lives, and so increase rights.
At the box in Berlin, she said, there was safety backed by the full facilities of a maternity unit. Once a baby is in the hatch, an alarm rings and medical staff come, even as the mother walks away unseen. The baby is cared for in the hospital and then fostered before going into the legal system for adoption. In the early period, mothers can return and retrieve their child, but later they can't - adoption is final.
But some mothers do return. One told the BBC how she had been in despair when her child was born. The father was absent, and she was young and in a state of numb shock, so she took the route down the path - and then changed her mind barely a week later.
She followed the advice in the letter she had found in the hatch and returned. She said that, for the first time, she had realised it was her baby. She noticed his hair and eyes, and realised she couldn't give him away. Today, she returns to the unit with pictures of the child she now brings up. The baby box had given her time for her confusion to clear.
It's hard to know the full figures of how many relent - the critics of the system say that in Germany it is well-appointed, with the best facilities, but in some of the poorer countries to the east, baby boxes are less well organised.
But at one baby box in Hamburg, for example, there have been 42 babies left in the last 10 years. Seventeen of those mothers have then contacted the organisers, and 14 have taken back their child.
Steffanie Wolpert, one of the organisers of the system in Hamburg, says it has to be better than providing no facilities at all.
"In 1999, we had five babies abandoned and three of them were found dead.
"So we thought about this situation, and why it happened, and found a new way to help children to stay alive".
But the critics, like the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, are not convinced. They say that baby boxes are a throwback to the past when the medieval church had what were called "foundling wheels" - round windows through which unwanted babies could be passed.
Maria Herczog, a child psychologist who is on the committee, told the BBC that a better alternative, now as then, was more understanding and help for mothers in difficult circumstances.
"They send out the mistaken message to pregnant women that they are right to continue hiding their pregnancies, giving birth in uncontrolled circumstances and then abandoning their babies".
There is no clear right or wrong in this. It is an argument between well-meaning people. The one voice never heard is that of the mother who walks the path with the baby she bore secretly hours earlier, to return without the bundle. Her tears can barely be imagined.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18585020
By Stephen Evans, BBC News, Berlin
Boxes where parents can leave an unwanted baby, common in medieval Europe, have been making a comeback over the last 10 years. Supporters say a heated box, monitored by nurses, is better for babies than abandonment on the street - but the UN says it violates the rights of the child.
It is an unlikely scene for the most painful of dramas. On the edge of a road in a leafy suburb of Berlin, there is a sign pointing through the trees down a path. It says "Babywiege" - Baby Cradle.
At the end of that path, there is a stainless steel hatch with a handle. Pull that hatch open, and there are neatly folded blankets for a baby. The warmth is safe and reassuring. There is a letter, too, telling you who to call if you change your mind.
About twice a year, someone - presumably a woman - treads that path at the secluded rear of Waldfriede Hospital and leaves the baby, perhaps born in secret only a few hours earlier.
That person - presumably the mother - then turns and walks away, never to see the baby again. The baby grows, but never gets to know who his or her mother was.
The word "presumably" is used because the process is secret and anonymous, so nobody knows who the people are who make that walk, carrying a baby to reverse their steps without one.
So one of the arguments made by those who condemn the system is that it may well be men who are giving the baby away, dumping him or her seems too hard a word. The critics say that baby boxes may be used by unscrupulous fathers or even controllers of prostitutes to put pressure on mothers to dispose of an unwanted baby.
The psychologist, Kevin Browne of Nottingham University told the BBC: "Studies in Hungary show that it's not necessarily mothers who place babies in these boxes - that it's relatives, pimps, step-fathers, fathers.
"Therefore, the big question is: are these baby boxes upholding women's rights, and has the mother of that child consented to the baby being placed in the baby box?"
Professor Browne continued: "The baby hatch is so anonymous, and so removed from the availability of counselling, that it creates a damage and a danger to the mother and child."
On this argument, by making it so easy to get rid of a baby, mothers are less likely to get the real help they need in their situation of great emotional trauma and even physical risk.
It is an argument the people who set up baby boxes reject. They say, rather, that they are offering desperate mothers a safe way to get rid of their unwanted babies. Those who don't walk the path to the baby box might instead leave the baby in the biting cold of a public place.
Or worse. A court case has just finished in Germany where a mother was prosecuted for killing her baby by throwing it from a fifth-floor balcony.
This kind of case is giving a push to the movement for more baby boxes across Central and Eastern Europe, from the Baltic states, down through Germany, Austria, Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, to Romania. The law in some countries encourages their spread - in Hungary, for example, it was changed so that leaving a baby in the official baby box was deemed to be a legal act amounting to consent to adoption, while dumping a child anywhere else remains a crime.
Professor Browne thinks that the spread is greatest in countries with a communist past (and so an attitude that the authorities will take over child-rearing) or in Catholic countries where the stigma of unmarried motherhood is stronger.
He did much of the unpublished research on which the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child relied in its assessment of the system. It believes that children have a right to know who their parents are and that right is denied to the foundlings left in baby boxes.
The proponents don't accept that for a moment. Gabriele Stangl, of Waldfriede Hospital in Berlin, said that baby boxes save lives, and so increase rights.
At the box in Berlin, she said, there was safety backed by the full facilities of a maternity unit. Once a baby is in the hatch, an alarm rings and medical staff come, even as the mother walks away unseen. The baby is cared for in the hospital and then fostered before going into the legal system for adoption. In the early period, mothers can return and retrieve their child, but later they can't - adoption is final.
But some mothers do return. One told the BBC how she had been in despair when her child was born. The father was absent, and she was young and in a state of numb shock, so she took the route down the path - and then changed her mind barely a week later.
She followed the advice in the letter she had found in the hatch and returned. She said that, for the first time, she had realised it was her baby. She noticed his hair and eyes, and realised she couldn't give him away. Today, she returns to the unit with pictures of the child she now brings up. The baby box had given her time for her confusion to clear.
It's hard to know the full figures of how many relent - the critics of the system say that in Germany it is well-appointed, with the best facilities, but in some of the poorer countries to the east, baby boxes are less well organised.
But at one baby box in Hamburg, for example, there have been 42 babies left in the last 10 years. Seventeen of those mothers have then contacted the organisers, and 14 have taken back their child.
Steffanie Wolpert, one of the organisers of the system in Hamburg, says it has to be better than providing no facilities at all.
"In 1999, we had five babies abandoned and three of them were found dead.
"So we thought about this situation, and why it happened, and found a new way to help children to stay alive".
But the critics, like the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, are not convinced. They say that baby boxes are a throwback to the past when the medieval church had what were called "foundling wheels" - round windows through which unwanted babies could be passed.
Maria Herczog, a child psychologist who is on the committee, told the BBC that a better alternative, now as then, was more understanding and help for mothers in difficult circumstances.
"They send out the mistaken message to pregnant women that they are right to continue hiding their pregnancies, giving birth in uncontrolled circumstances and then abandoning their babies".
There is no clear right or wrong in this. It is an argument between well-meaning people. The one voice never heard is that of the mother who walks the path with the baby she bore secretly hours earlier, to return without the bundle. Her tears can barely be imagined.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18585020
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China rescuers save baby lodged in sewage pipe
Firefighters in China have rescued a newborn baby boy lodged inside a sewage pipe leading off a toilet.
Residents of an apartment building in Jinhua city, Zhejiang province, called rescuers on Saturday after they heard the infant's cries.
Rescuers tried to pull the baby out of the pipe but failed and ended up sawing through a section of the pipe instead.
They took the pipe to hospital, where it was carefully pulled apart to release the infant.
The baby, thought to be just a few days old, was found inside a pipe 10cm (4 inches) in diameter, says China Daily newspaper.
Footage from state television showed firefighters and doctors working together using pliers to cut the pipe apart to get to the baby.
The baby is now in stable condition, reports say.
The police are said to be treating the case as attempted murder and are searching for the parents, says the BBC's Martin Patience in Beijing.
The baby was named Baby No 59 - after the number of his hospital incubator, the Associated Press news agency reported.
A number of visitors had arrived at the hospital with contributions of nappies, baby clothes and powdered milk, the news agency added.
The case generated condemnation on weibo, China's version of Twitter.
"The parents who did this have hearts even filthier than that sewage pipe," one user was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying.
"Can these people be called human beings?" another user was quoted by Agence-France Presse as saying.
China has strict family planning rules, with the one-child policy in place for more than three decades. Although there are a number of exceptions, couples can face fines if they violate the policy.
There have also been cases of babies born outside marriage being abandoned, or female newborns abandoned because of a traditional preference for sons.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-22685445
Firefighters in China have rescued a newborn baby boy lodged inside a sewage pipe leading off a toilet.
Residents of an apartment building in Jinhua city, Zhejiang province, called rescuers on Saturday after they heard the infant's cries.
Rescuers tried to pull the baby out of the pipe but failed and ended up sawing through a section of the pipe instead.
They took the pipe to hospital, where it was carefully pulled apart to release the infant.
The baby, thought to be just a few days old, was found inside a pipe 10cm (4 inches) in diameter, says China Daily newspaper.
Footage from state television showed firefighters and doctors working together using pliers to cut the pipe apart to get to the baby.
The baby is now in stable condition, reports say.
The police are said to be treating the case as attempted murder and are searching for the parents, says the BBC's Martin Patience in Beijing.
The baby was named Baby No 59 - after the number of his hospital incubator, the Associated Press news agency reported.
A number of visitors had arrived at the hospital with contributions of nappies, baby clothes and powdered milk, the news agency added.
The case generated condemnation on weibo, China's version of Twitter.
"The parents who did this have hearts even filthier than that sewage pipe," one user was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying.
"Can these people be called human beings?" another user was quoted by Agence-France Presse as saying.
China has strict family planning rules, with the one-child policy in place for more than three decades. Although there are a number of exceptions, couples can face fines if they violate the policy.
There have also been cases of babies born outside marriage being abandoned, or female newborns abandoned because of a traditional preference for sons.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-22685445
CarlosTheDJ
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:shock: and :cry:
ramonmercado
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Mythopoeika
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Accidentally on poo-pose, more like. :hmph:
I'm glad that the baby is OK. Some people are just horrible, aren't they?
I'm glad that the baby is OK. Some people are just horrible, aren't they?
Mythopoeika
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rynner2 said:
Well...she didn't alert the emergency services herself, she wasn't present for the rescue, and she didn't fess up until the authorities confronted her.
Surely that should tell you all you need to know?
JamesWhitehead
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It was the usual way for mothers to dispose of unwanted babies in the toilet in the days of soil. The arrival of the water-closet exposed the extent of the problem.
This horrid case shows how little things have really moved on.
This horrid case shows how little things have really moved on.
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No, it doesn't. She's apparently a troubled young women in a society very different from ours.Mythopoeika said:
Your comment, "Some people are just horrible, aren't they?" seems to say she wanted the child to die, or even intended the child to die. But (again according to various (reported) reports) "She is reported to have raised the initial alarm, despite not admitting it was her baby until later."
Not the action of a murderer, I'd suggest, just that of a troubled young woman. So I'm giving her the benefit of the doubt.
Mythopoeika
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rynner2 said:
You always look for the best in people.
Fluttermoth
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It is a very sad story but, as I've mentioned on other threads, the raised hormones involved in pregnancy and birth are well known for causing psychotic-like behaviours. Even in law, I believe, post partum women aren't held as accountable for some of their actions, especially towards their newborns, as 'sane' people would be.
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I agree with Ryn on this one, she was a very frightened young woman.
JamesWhitehead
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Fluttermoth said:
Hormone-related excuses for psychotic behaviour are increasingly unfashionable, though, aren't they? :?
ramonmercado
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Another from Oz - not a good start to life:
Mother charged for abandoning baby in drain in Sydney
[video]
Australian police have charged a 30-year-old woman with attempted murder after she abandoned her newborn baby in a drain in western Sydney.
They say the baby boy, who is in a serious but stable condition, may have survived up to five days in the drain. :shock:
He was discovered 2.5m (8ft) down inside the pit by a group of passing cyclists on Sunday morning.
It took several people to lift the heavy concrete slab to rescue the baby, who was malnourished and dehydrated.
Police believe the baby was born last Monday and 24 hours later was squeezed through the narrow opening of a stormwater drain, falling 2.5 metres.
The baby is currently receiving treatment at Sydney's Westmead Children's Hospital.
It is a distressing story of abandonment and an amazing story of survival, says the BBC's Phil Mercer in Sydney.
Police doubt the baby would have survived much longer, given that in the past few days Sydney has had record breaking temperatures in excess of 40C, he adds.
David Otte and his daughter were alerted to the baby's crying as they cycled near the M7 motorway at Quakers Hill on Sunday morning, according to local reports.
"It was so intense. You couldn't not tell it was a baby," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Mr Otte as saying.
The cyclists said they "couldn't see it but we could hear it"
"We couldn't see it but we could hear it. It was distressed."
Police said they found the mother after checking hospital records and knocking on doors in the local area.
Local police inspector David Lagats described the discovery of the baby as "disturbing".
He told reporters the baby was found wrapped in a striped blanket similar to what is given to newborn babies in hospital.
"The umbilical cord had been cut and had been clamped so there appears to have been some sort of medical intervention since his birth," he added.
The mother of the baby was represented legally in a Sydney court on Monday but did not appear in person, ABC reports.
She has been formally denied bail and is expected to appear in court on Friday.
The local magistrate reportedly recommended the mother receive post-natal care whilst in custody.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-30172577
Mother charged for abandoning baby in drain in Sydney
[video]
Australian police have charged a 30-year-old woman with attempted murder after she abandoned her newborn baby in a drain in western Sydney.
They say the baby boy, who is in a serious but stable condition, may have survived up to five days in the drain. :shock:
He was discovered 2.5m (8ft) down inside the pit by a group of passing cyclists on Sunday morning.
It took several people to lift the heavy concrete slab to rescue the baby, who was malnourished and dehydrated.
Police believe the baby was born last Monday and 24 hours later was squeezed through the narrow opening of a stormwater drain, falling 2.5 metres.
The baby is currently receiving treatment at Sydney's Westmead Children's Hospital.
It is a distressing story of abandonment and an amazing story of survival, says the BBC's Phil Mercer in Sydney.
Police doubt the baby would have survived much longer, given that in the past few days Sydney has had record breaking temperatures in excess of 40C, he adds.
David Otte and his daughter were alerted to the baby's crying as they cycled near the M7 motorway at Quakers Hill on Sunday morning, according to local reports.
"It was so intense. You couldn't not tell it was a baby," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Mr Otte as saying.
The cyclists said they "couldn't see it but we could hear it"
"We couldn't see it but we could hear it. It was distressed."
Police said they found the mother after checking hospital records and knocking on doors in the local area.
Local police inspector David Lagats described the discovery of the baby as "disturbing".
He told reporters the baby was found wrapped in a striped blanket similar to what is given to newborn babies in hospital.
"The umbilical cord had been cut and had been clamped so there appears to have been some sort of medical intervention since his birth," he added.
The mother of the baby was represented legally in a Sydney court on Monday but did not appear in person, ABC reports.
She has been formally denied bail and is expected to appear in court on Friday.
The local magistrate reportedly recommended the mother receive post-natal care whilst in custody.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-30172577
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Baby found abandoned in manger at New York church
Newborn is deposited at Holy Child Jesus Church’s indoor nativity scene after worker who built it went for lunch break
Reuters
Wednesday 25 November 2015 02.18 GMT
A newborn with his umbilical cord still attached was found lying in a manger at a New York church, police said on Tuesday.
The crying infant was found on Monday wrapped in towels in the indoor nativity scene by the custodian at the Holy Child Jesus Church, a New York police spokesman said. The custodian had just set up the scene before taking a lunch break.
Father Christopher Ryan Heanue, one of the priests at the church in the borough of Queens, said he and others placed a clean towel around the baby while waiting for paramedics to arrive.
“The beautiful thing is that this woman found in this church - which is supposed to be a home for those in need – this home for her child,” Heanue said, referring to the person he assumed left the baby there.
“A young couple in our parish would love to adopt this child and keep this gift in our community. It would make a great Christmas miracle,” Heanue said.
Paramedics took the healthy baby to Jamaica Hospital and police are investigating the incident, the police spokesman said.
Under New York state law, a parent may abandon a newborn anonymously at certain designated safe locations, as long as the baby is handed over to an appropriate person.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/25/baby-found-abandoned-in-manger-at-new-york-church
Newborn is deposited at Holy Child Jesus Church’s indoor nativity scene after worker who built it went for lunch break
Reuters
Wednesday 25 November 2015 02.18 GMT
A newborn with his umbilical cord still attached was found lying in a manger at a New York church, police said on Tuesday.
The crying infant was found on Monday wrapped in towels in the indoor nativity scene by the custodian at the Holy Child Jesus Church, a New York police spokesman said. The custodian had just set up the scene before taking a lunch break.
Father Christopher Ryan Heanue, one of the priests at the church in the borough of Queens, said he and others placed a clean towel around the baby while waiting for paramedics to arrive.
“The beautiful thing is that this woman found in this church - which is supposed to be a home for those in need – this home for her child,” Heanue said, referring to the person he assumed left the baby there.
“A young couple in our parish would love to adopt this child and keep this gift in our community. It would make a great Christmas miracle,” Heanue said.
Paramedics took the healthy baby to Jamaica Hospital and police are investigating the incident, the police spokesman said.
Under New York state law, a parent may abandon a newborn anonymously at certain designated safe locations, as long as the baby is handed over to an appropriate person.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/nov/25/baby-found-abandoned-in-manger-at-new-york-church
ramonmercado
CyberPunk
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Truly bizarre.
Chinese police have arrested a woman accused of abandoning her own baby by posting it to an orphanage.
The infant had been wrapped in plastic bags and sent by courier, local media reported.
The motorbike driver could see the bag moving and hear cries from inside it when he collected it, the Beijing Times said - but was ordered not to open it by the baby's mother.
It was only when he arrived at the Children's Welfare Institute in Fuzhou that staff unwrapped the parcel and made the shock discovery. ...
http://news.sky.com/story/chinese-baby-abandoned-and-posted-to-orphanage-10985161
Chinese police have arrested a woman accused of abandoning her own baby by posting it to an orphanage.
The infant had been wrapped in plastic bags and sent by courier, local media reported.
The motorbike driver could see the bag moving and hear cries from inside it when he collected it, the Beijing Times said - but was ordered not to open it by the baby's mother.
It was only when he arrived at the Children's Welfare Institute in Fuzhou that staff unwrapped the parcel and made the shock discovery. ...
http://news.sky.com/story/chinese-baby-abandoned-and-posted-to-orphanage-10985161
Comfortably Numb
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"Newborn girl found alive in shallow grave in India". Folks, restricted in what I can format postwise - having to use Opera browser on smart TV and it doesn't seem to do <RETURN>. The URL is www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-50038657
AnonyJ
Captainess Sensible
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IMNSHO: Being the most populous country on earth, and in a still-developing condition, India still has extremes of inequality and behaviour - yet as in our own country there are shades of practice, individuals who act badly, politicians out for glory and communities resistant to change. I don't think we can generalise about 1.3+ billion people as a homogenous whole.
Unexpected and unwanted babies are still concealed, left for dead or abandoned in every country on Earth. It's appalling but it goes on, even in developed nations.
e.g., UK - https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/6169755/baby-pearl-mum-may-be-rape-incest-victim-2/
China https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/crying-baby-found-abandoned-under-20352388
It happens with depressing regularity.
The status of girls in south Asia as a whole is improving somewhat; I don't think it's true that girls are "generally" unwanted. Some families want a daughter, some do not, given the regional preferences for sons in parts of Asia. There are strongholds of strong boy-preference in some parts of India (Gujarat, Delhi, Haryana) for example but the acts of sex-selection during fertility treatment, sex-diagnostic ultrasounds, and aborting female foetuses are illegal and are carried out by the middle classes - not the dirt-poor.
Going by the clues in the story it sounds more likely it was a concealed birth, and the little girl was buried by the mother or a close family member. Little boys are in demand for formal or informal adoption in India and so would maybe have a chance of surviving even in an awful situation that leads to a concealed birth.
In 1969, the USA sent men to the moon. They'd spent more than 10 years attempting it. At that time there were still 'Jim Crow' laws in place in some states, people living in shacks and shanties, political corruption and widespread inequalities country-wide (especially in the segregated south) yet no-one seemed to feel they shouldn't try and should just spend the money on education, health or housing.
I don't see the difference between the two situations - unless it's that we still think of India and Indians as totally backward and suffering absolute poverty as in the days of the 60s & 70s (which it's not now, for the most part).