A newborn Chinese baby was rescued from a toilet pipe after he was flushed away by his parents, state TV reports.
Chinese firefighters found the tiny boy lodged in a sewage pipe below a squat toilet in an apartment building in Jinhua, Zhejiang province. His placenta was still attached.
Firefighters sawed out an L-shaped section wide on Saturday afternoon after neighbors reported hearing crying. The baby was taken to a nearby hospital, where doctors cut around him to pull out the abandoned infant.
The 2-day-old child — named Baby No. 59 from the number of his hospital incubator — was reported in stable condition at a nearby hospital.
A video of the two-hour rescue was broadcast widely on Chinese news programs and websites late Monday and Tuesday. News of the ordeal prompted an outpouring from strangers who came to the hospital with diapers, baby clothes, powdered milk and offers to adopt the child.
Despites the offers to adopt Baby No. 59, a doctor at the hospital said the boy would be handed over to social services if his parents do not claim him, Zhejiang News said.
Police are treating the case as an attempted homicide and are looking for the mother and anyone else involved in the incident.
The landlord of the building in Pujiang County told Zhejiang News that it was unlikely the birth took place in the toilet room because there was no evidence of blood and she was not aware of any recent pregnancies among her tenants.
The incident has sparked outrage on China’s Twitter-like service Sina Weibo, reports ABC.net.au.
“The parents who did this have hearts even filthier than that sewage pipe,” wrote one user.
With News Wire Services
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