A newborn baby boy lodged
in a sewage pipe directly
beneath a toilet has been
rescued by firefighters in
eastern China.
Police are treating the case
as attempted homicide and
are looking for his parents.
It has sparked anger on
social media sites.
China’s state broadcaster CCTV said
the abandoned infant was found in
the sewage pipe in a residential
building in Jinhua in the wealthy
coastal province of Zhejiang.
The two-day-old boy was
discovered after residents of the
building reported the sound of a
baby crying, state television said.
Firefighters had to remove the
pipe, reported to be 10cm (three
inches) in diameter, and take it to a
nearby hospital, where doctors
carefully cut around it to rescue
the baby inside, the report said.
They spent nearly an hour taking
the tube apart piece by piece with
pliers and saws and finally
recovered the 5lb (2.3kg) boy,
whose placenta was still attached.
State-run news site Zhejiang News
said the child – named Baby No 59
from the number of his incubator –
is safe and in a stable condition.
Video footage of the rescue was
broadcast nationally overnight.
The news triggered hundreds of
thousands of comments on China’s
hugely popular Weibo service,
which is similar to Twitter, with
users expressing good wishes for
the baby and fury at those who
presumably abandoned him.
“I can never accept or forgive the
behaviour of dumping the baby
with his placenta and umbilical
cord attached into the toilet pipe,”
wrote a user with the online handle
Jiding Jiajia.
“Can these people be called human
beings? The animal to human ratio
among the grown-ups is rising
inexorably.”
Another user, If-Free, said
watching the rescue left her
distraught.
“Seeing the little one wriggling and
groaning as the pipe was torn apart
bit by bit wrings my heart …
You’ve lived through the hardest
moment in your life and your
future will definitely be smooth,”
she said.
There are frequent reports in
Chinese media of babies being
abandoned, often shortly after
birth.
The problem is attributed to
factors such as young mothers
unaware they were pregnant, the
birth of an unwanted girl in a
society which puts greater value on
boys or China’s strict family
planning rules.
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