Newborn baby rescued alive after being flushed down toilet in China

[.jCliff]

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.

Source: SkyNews

Checking the news this morning i just had to share this, absolutely disgusting behavior.. shocking.

[LittleNeutrino Veteran]

that is a truly horrible thing that someone could do, I am amazed each time i read a story where someone would rid them selves of a child in any manner other than to put it up for adoption. It is just horrible.

[neufuse Veteran]

how big are the toilets in china? sheesh... the average pipe size in the USA is a whole 3" for a toilet and I know the story says that was the same in this case, but I just don't see a baby getting into that space easily or even at all, especially since a toilet trap is even smaller than that!

[compl3x]

how big are the toilets in china? sheesh...

That is what I was thinking when I read the headline. Are toilets in china designed differently than the Western ones?

[neufuse Veteran]

now they are saying it is a 4" pipe...

definitely doesn't look like schedule 40 pipe looks more like thin wall schedule 20... and looks a LOT more like a 6" line then a 4" line but question still stands how the heck did a baby get down a toilet trap? heck it's hard enough for way thinner waste to get down those traps at times and they are usually S shape

[Hum]

Maybe it will turn out to be a made-up story.

[neufuse Veteran]

Maybe it will turn out to be a made-up story.

like most of these stories that come out of china anymore? kinda like the sextoy "valuable mushroom"?

[Roger H. Veteran]

Saw the pictures and its definitely bigger than 3 inches. That was like a 4in septic tube. Babies heads don't fit in 3" holes easily - women out there can attest to that. :no:

Totally crazy though and what a way to start life. Must be a teenager though that hid the pregnancy i'm thinking because boy babies are usually "valuable" in China because of that 1 child rule. They usually get rid of girl babies (which is still SICK :angry:) but surprised the baby survived either way. (Y)

[majortom1981]

Isn't their still the culture of everyone wanting boys in china? Why would they just flush a male child down the toilet like that.

[MDboyz]

These people are sinking lower than animals. Even animals don't do that to their own. These people are just sick. If you can't be responsible for another life, just don't spread your legs ...

[neufuse Veteran]

These people are sinking lower than animals. Even animals don't do that to their own. These people are just sick. If you can't be responsible for another life, just don't spread your legs ...

some animals do, when they feel the baby is sick or wont survive they will segregate it from the other babies... Cats are notorious for that

[Original Poster]

this might sound harsh but im simply pointing it out... why flush a boy? from what I hear you can get 10k for a boy in china... possibly she was scared when going to the toilet? didnt realise she was pregnant and POOF baby ? ive heard it happen

[Growled Member]

There sure is a rough way to start your life.

[bradsday]

Isn't their still the culture of everyone wanting boys in china? Why would they just flush a male child down the toilet like that.

I was thinking the exact same thing. It was my understanding that Chinese parents routinely abort female fetuses after discovering the sex after an ultrasound. So much in fact, that American and European physicians are hesitant to provide the sex of a child to a Chinese couple.

My wife, the smart one in our family, noted that the Chinese are still restricted to one child per family. She posed that maybe the family already has a child and that maybe they were afraid of retribution from the Chinese government for having another. An interesting point to ponder.