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What happened to boarder babies?

Posted by freya 
What happened to boarder babies?
February 09, 2020
This was a big term in the 1990's: boarder babies were abandoned by their mothers at the hospital mostly because of either poverty or drugs. I found articles which states there were over 20K in 1993 and that by the late 90's the numbers were over 30K. One or more articles in the 2000's talk about Safe Haven laws. But when I look at the Safe Haven statistics they aren't in the ballpark of the numbers seen with boarder babies. I think drug usage has increased since the 90's. There are entire towns now known as Meth towns that didn't have that distinction in the 90's. Does anyone know where the boarder babies are now? I think the population has greatly increased since the 90's so it would makes sense that there are more boarder babies being born each year.

This report states more 3,500 babies have been abandoned since 1999 at safe havens:
https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2018-07-10/baby-boxes-safe-haven-laws-a-last-resort-to-curb-infant-abandonment

Based on the statistics from the late 90's and population growth I'd expect at least 50-75K babies to be abandoned each year. But the report above is for 19 years and claims more than 3,500 babies have been abandoned. While that is likely true it doesn't sound anywhere near a realistic number of babies abandoned.

Where do all the abandoned babies go?
Re: What happened to boarder babies?
February 09, 2020
I'm assuming there's still fear of identification in regard to Safe Haven laws, I'm not sure if it's done truly anonymously or not. But I also imagine more babies wind up in dumpsters and bathrooms, are abadoned in places where they are never found, or are killed via PNA.

I'm pretty sure there has been a HUGE increase in the number of child murder cases since the 90s - usually I can't go a day without seeing a headline about someone killing their own kids. I'm guessing since there's such a stigma attached to abandoning a child that it's "better" to take them home and kill them because they can blame post-partum depression, whereas abandoning their poor helpless infants at hospitals with people who will care for them makes them monsters. shrug

I seriously doubt the number of abandoned babies has only been 3,500 since 1999. Maybe the number abandoned at Safe Havens (I wonder if that includes the 60 or so dumped in Nebraska before the age limit was specified), but certainly not the total number abandoned. Do people still do that thing where they leave unwanted loaves on doorsteps?
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