Baby, B..B..B..Baby Safe Haven!

Bostonist has listened to the high school students rapping safe haven for weeks. An article in the Dig showed up a little while after the ads started to catch on more than we would like. The Safe Haven Law passed last October has finally made the first baby safe under the new act. An infant was dropped off at a hospital in the Merrimack Valley. The hospital’s name is undisclosed, as is the mother’s and father’s, and now the foster parents identities. The Dig article reported that the safe haven ads were actually taking hold. According to the Department of Social Services 60 percent of the target demographic is aware of the safe haven law and 90 percent of those clearly understood what it meant. Promising, seeing that in Louisiana, where a month ago, an infant was found dead in the trunk of her mother’s car—and yes, Louisiana does have a similar baby safe haven law.

There is something to be said with cheap advertising, no matter how chintzy it appears, if the intended message is expressed. The safety of children is something hard to argue against in any situation and this legislation and ad has now proven effective. The child brought to the hospital’s safe haven has already been surrendered to a foster home. Too bad that this law only applies to children under seven days old, Bostonist would really like to have been able to get rid of our siblings when they were about six years old.