http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,261588,00.html
I've never heard of this before. I have heard of people who abandon babies, but never an actual place for this to be done. I thought people just left them in bathrooms or on doorsteps if they wanted them to be found alive and taken care of.
Because of the number of babies being abandoned in the trash to die, or killed and then dumped, Germany has installed some baby hatches. These hatches are located in an isolated area of the hospital. There are usually trees and stuff to conceal people from veiw. People can just sneak over and slide the baby in, and it falls into an incubator. After a few minutes (to give the person time to get away undetected) an alarm goes off to alert hospital staff that a baby was put into the hatch.
This is to prevent people from killing their baby and it offers them the chance to abandon the baby but know that it will be taken care of. It is actually a very old idea. In mideval times they had something called a foundling wheel. This is an idea that is regaining popularity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_hatch
Some people are opposed to this because they think it will invite anyone to just get rid of their child. But I figure that if they are the type of person that is going to do this, it would be done anyway sooner or later, and at least they can do it and know the baby will be taken care of.
Maybe some mothers would abandon a baby that might not abandon one otherwise. But I figure that some people shouldn't be mothers. So it is probably better to do this than to have a baby around that is neglected or just barely tolerated, but not ever loved and wanted.