concealment of birth

There were 4 cases of abandonment and one case of concealment of birth reported in 2007.

Section 163 of the Criminal Code Act creates the offence of concealment of birth.

Muller, 21, of Millbuie Farm, Skene, Aberdeenshire, who admitted contravening the 1809 Concealment of Birth (Scotland) Act, was placed on probation for a year.

Most of these cases of concealment of birth go unreported; Windhoek Water Works alone reported in 2008 that they discover 13 dead newborns in their waste water system per month.

The Church supported the system by a system of licensing and required midwives to swear to certain rules relating to contraception, abortion and concealment of births and also to deliver the new born infants for baptism or in extreme cases to perform the ceremony themselves.