Mother of baby found in sewer says lover abandoned her

Beijing Bulletin (IANS) Wednesday 29th May, 2013

The 22-year-old mother of the baby found trapped in a sewer pipe in China says she became pregnant following a one-night stand, and the father of the baby abandoned her and she could not afford an abortion.

The woman - who was not named - said she could not cope with the stigma of being a single mother, the Daily Mail reported.

Chinese media said she went to the bathroom in a residential complex when she felt abdominal cramps, and gave birth.

But she said the baby slipped into the sewer pipe and she was unable to free him.

She also claimed she was the first to raise the alarm and then watched the entire two-hour rescue in secret.

"The girl told the landlord she had heard a 'kitten-like' sound in the fourth-floor toilet. The landlord called the police and fire fighters for help," an investigating police officer in the eastern Chinese city of Jinhua told the Daily Mail.

Police are investigating if her version was true or if the baby was dumped intentionally into the sewer pipe.

The woman, a restaurant worker, reportedly confessed to being the mother after officers found blood-stained tissues in her room and asked her to undergo a medical check.

"The woman said she felt too embarrassed to call the police herself as a single mother and feeling under societal pressure.

"The woman said she felt too embarrassed to call the police herself as a single mother and feeling under societal pressure. Girls like her can are easy targets for public criticism," the police officer told the daily.

The woman said she had sex with a man, who has denied it is his baby.

She was too scared to tell her parents so hid her pregnancy by wearing loose clothes and wrapping cloth tightly around her abdomen.

The baby has been named "Baby No 59", after his incubator number in the hospital where he is being kept.

Fire fighters were called to the building to rescue the baby, trapped in the pipe attached to a toilet. They removed the pipe from the ceiling using pliers and saws. Fearing they may harm the baby, they took him to hospital still trapped in the pipe, and doctors then carefully cut him free..

Newborn baby rescued from sewer pipe

CRI, May 29, 2013

Firefighters have rescued a newborn boy from a sewer pipe below a squat toilet, sawing out an L-shaped section and then delicately dismantling it to free the cocooned baby, who greeted the rescuers with cries.

Firefighters and doctors rescue a newborn baby by cutting away a sewage pipe piece by piece, in this still image taken from video, in Jinhua city, Zhejiang province May 25, 2013. [Photo/Weibo.com]

A tenant heard the baby's sounds in the public restroom of a residential building in Zhejiang province in eastern China on Saturday and notified authorities, according to the state-run news site Zhejiang News.

The baby was subsequently taken to hospital for treatment.

Video footage of the rescue was broadcast nationally overnight.

Zhejiang News says the child, named Baby No. 59 from the number of his incubator, is safe.

Police are treating the case as an attempted homicide, and are looking for the mother and anyone else involved.

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 show up to claim him, Zhejiang News said.