Finnish Babies are Sleeping In Cardboard Boxes

The Finnish Baby Box is an added little bit of excitement for expectant mothers in Finland. Not only are they in that awesome happy time of waiting for their first born, they’re also waiting to see what’s in the box!

What’s All This Baby Box Chatter?

This Finnish Government are a supremely caring bunch it seems, not only to they provide free health care, free maternal care and free schooling, but for 77 years they’ve been ensuring every expectant mother, regardless of their financial background, receives a ‘Baby Box’ stocked full of quality (and cute!) baby needs to get the them started.

The only things the mums-to-be have to do is fill out a form, provide proof of pregnancy from their healthcare provider and then happily pick up the box from the post office after 154 days of pregnancy.

Quite timely I thought as no nesting mother-to-be wants to leave these things to the last minute! These ladies have a choice between the box and a cash payment of 140 Euros ($207AUD), but 95% of them choose the box as contents are worth much more.

Where Did It All Begin?

It all began in 1938 when Finland was a poor country with a high infant mortality rate of 65 deaths per 1000 births.

The Finnish government began supplying these boxes in an effort to increase newborn life expectancy and it worked. The figures improved rapidly and the current figure is 3 deaths per 1000 births.

Sounds Cool! What’s In It?

The boxes which originally contained material, as women were used to making their children’s clothes, changed to ready-made clothes in the 1950’s.The selection included was, and is today, a big help to new mothers who weren’t really sure what they’ll need first up. The contents of the boxes are still locally sourced or made by companies of Finnish ownership and are always high-quality and well-designed items.

 A 2015 Finnish Baby Box contains over 50 items:

• A Box! It’s big and pretty and can be used as baby’s first crib!
• Mattress to go in the box
• Mattress cover, sheet, blanket and blanket cover
• Insulated sleeping bag which converts to a snow suit
• Sleeping bag which converts to a quilt
• Lightly quilted suit
• Snow hat, insulated booties and mittens, balaclava and warm wool bodysuit (it’s chilly there)
• 11 assorted gender neutral romper suits
• 5 pairs of leggings
• Tights,2 pairs of socks, mittens and knitted hat
• Bath towel, nail scissor, toothbrush, hairbrush and bath thermometer
• 2 Modern cloth nappies and 2 nappy change mats
• Feeding bib and drooling bib
• Book and Toy
• Pads, condoms, nipple cream and breast pads for mum