A gynecology and obstetrics hospital in Kumamoto has become the first medical institution to provide a "special adoption service" at the request of the Japan Medical Association, health ministry officials said Thursday.
Fukuda Hospital has arranged two adoptions since May after it was asked by the association to offer the service to help prevent child abuse and abandonment, they said.
The special adoption service is intended for children under age 6 whose biological parents are unable to raise them. The adopting parents taking this route would seek to have a family court sever the legal relationship between the child and the biological parents. The child would then be allowed to join the adoptive family's registry under that family's name, without any mention of having been adopted.
In normal adoptions, the biological family's name is retained and the child is noted as being adopted in the new family's registry.
Fukuda Hospital also rejects donations from parents who want to adopt.
"Any dubious money flow should not accompany child adoption services," Fukuda Hospital chief Shigeru Fukuda said.
A private adoption clinic in Tokyo recently came under fire for accepting large donations from couples eager to adopt.