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Last year, Iowa expanded its original Safe Haven law to include use of Safe Haven Baby Boxes as a drop-off. So far only 2 boxes have been installed in the state: Fort Dodge ( October 12, 2023) and DeMoines (October 8, 2024). Unless an abandonment box case has not been announced to the public; thus, we don’t know about it, neither box was used.
Yet, on December 5, 2024, a short news story (example KCII-TV) went over the wire with the following claim:
Kelly Kennedy Garcia, Iowa’s director of Health and Human Services, noted a rise in surrendered babies since the law’s expansion, with 22% of all Iowa Safe Haven babies surrendered in the last two years.
Oddly, only 2 days earlier, on December 3, HSS posted a press release announcing that 6 newborns had been safe-havened this year and 10 in 2023.
So what is Ms. Garcia talking about?
The number of this year’s cases is smaller than last year, and a baby box wasn’t used in any of those “relinquishments.” All cases were trad not via baby box. Please explain how the presence of baby boxes in the state has boosted the number of cases when they weren’t used.
Even if numbers are down, when HSS says they are,( or not)depending on the agency’s PR mood, is HHS so clueless that it can’t connect Dobbs to Safe Haven abandonments? Why doesn’t the media notice this?
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