UNIAN reports that “windows of life” — special niches at Kyiv hospitals, monasteries, and convents where troubled parents can leave their babies — will open in Kyiv before the end of the year.
Says Volodymyr Zahorodnii, deputy head of Kyiv’s Chief Healthcare Directorate: “Between 25 and 30 foundlings are registered in the city every year. These babies are left in parks, doorways, supermarkets, and dumpsters. We’re trying to help these foundlings the best we can. However, not all of them can be saved on account of being found too late. The ‘windows of life’ are kept warm. They will first be installed in children’s hospitals, and later at Hospitals Nos. 6 and 10, as well as polyclinics in the Solomianka raion of Kyiv. Each ‘window’ will function as follows: once a baby is left there, a sensor activates a buzzer on the duty nurse’s desk. After collecting the baby, the physician on duty notifies the police (militia) to duly register the foundling… There will be no ca-meras to tape the person who leaves the baby.”
Physicians say that such “windows” are, of course, a positive innovation, although they can be potentially dangerous. A woman who is hesitating may be persuaded by such a cozy “window.” Nevertheless, this will increase the baby’s chance of survival. Foundlings left in these “windows” will not be stolen, by street beggars for example, because the babies are instantly collected by medical personnel. Incidentally, there are two anonymous foundling collection stations in Lviv. One “window of life” opened almost a year ago, and the second one in December 2009. In this period only one baby was deposited; it was adopted four months later.
Deputy Minister of Family and Youth Liudmyla Volynets said that 77 babies aged under 12 months were abandoned in Ukraine by their mothers last year according to official data. When caught in the act, such women can receive up to two years in prison.
