THE JAPAN NEWS


 

KUMAMOTO (Jiji Press) — Japan is slow in setting legislation to deal with isolated childbirth, an issue highlighted by the recent launch of a confidential birth program by a hospital in Kumamoto.

Jikei Hospital this month started the program allowing women to give birth while keeping their names secret.

The hospital known for its “Konotori no Yurikago” (stork’s cradle) baby hatch, where parents can leave their babies anonymously, made the fresh move in a bid to rescue women forced into isolated births because of financial or other problems.

In September 2017, a report compiled by a city task force on the hospital’s baby hatch pointed to the danger of isolated births, citing a case in which a women cut the umbilical cord with scissors on her own after delivery.
The report also took up children’s rights to know their origin and called on the central government to consider creating a system for confidential births.
Germany enacted a law on confidential births in 2014. Under the system, mothers entrust sealed envelopes containing their identities to authorities and give birth anonymously.

The children are raised as foster children and, when they reach 16, become eligible to access the document. If their birth mothers refuse access, family courts make decisions.

Jikei Hospital said in December 2017 that it was considering a program modeled on the German system and has since held discussions with the city of Kumamoto.

The municipality asked the central government to create a relevant law, saying that the matter cannot be solved between a municipality and a private hospital.

Meanwhile, the health ministry is studying such systems in Germany and elsewhere in a two-year project to the end of March 2020.

Jikei Hospital has its own rules for its program. A staff member keeps documents containing the mothers’ identities and gives children access to the information when they reach a certain age.

But Nara University Prof. Fumio Tokotani, a Civil Code specialist, said the hospital’s system is not enough in securing measures to deal with the conflict of interest between mothers’ privacy and children’s right to know their origin.

“This is something the government must handle,” Tokotani said.
A Kumamoto official said, “There needs to be a consensus in society on how to protect children’s right to know their origin.”

Other unclear points include legal procedures for those born under the hospital’s program, such as how they should be treated under the country’s family register system. Babies whose parents’ identities are unknown are usually named by local government heads, and their own family registers will be compiled independently.