Do ‘baby boxes’ promote child abandonment or save lives?

Two Edmonton hospitals have decided to offer a haven for unwanted infants in a move that is either vastly outdated or a stroke of conscience that could save the lives of abandoned children.

The program provides parents who do not want their newborn children a place to safely and anonymously abandon them, placing the child in the hands of health care professionals without question. The project is intended to stop mothers from abandoning their children in dumpsters, or otherwise putting their lives in danger.

"The 'angel cradle' offers a safe, last resort option where a newborn can be left anonymously," Dr. Geoffrey Cundiff has said.

The Catholic group behind the project calls them "angel cradles" but others, including the UN, dismiss them less poetically as "baby boxes."

The UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child says the idea of baby boxes is outdated and simply a form of abandonment, which strips the baby of its right to know the name of its biological parents. It claims such projects have not been proven to reduce infanticide or reduce abandonment.

So what do you think? Are "angel cradles" an effective way to give unwanted children a chance at life, or are do they simply mainstream child abandonment?