A 12-year-old Chinese girl who gave birth to a baby in secret, has abandoned the newborn girl in the bushes in the city of Yibin.
The baby was found last Friday and was taken to the hospital and is healthy.
Local police confirmed that the baby’s mother is a primary school pupil and is one of the ‘left-behind’ children in China, whose parents have moved away from them in order to seek work in the cities.
According to Chinese news The Paper, the baby girl was found in the Nanxi district of Yibin, a city in Sichuan Province.
The baby girl was spotted in the bushes by the side of a road under a highway bridge. She was immediately taken to the Nanxi Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine for a health inspection.
Paediatricians said that the girl had been born prematurely, but they were unable to take her body temperature because it appeared to be too low at the time. She was then given intravenous fluid and placed in an incubator to keep warm.
Other examination results of the baby showed no signs of health issues and local Red Cross center also sent volunteers to look after the baby girl.
The police reportedly found the baby’s mother on August 13.
The police said the mother is a 12-year-old schoolgirl, nicknamed Xiao Min, who lives in a nearby village. Local officials told the reporter that Xiao Min was a ‘left-behind’ children whose parents live and work in another city.
Apparently, Xiao Min’s parents brought her 13-year-old brother with them, however, left her to live with the grandparents.
Xiao Min’s class teacher and grandparents were said to be unaware that the 12-year-old girl was even pregnant.
The hospital has received donations from the public who learned the news through media and wanted to help the baby.
The newborn was transferred from the Nanxi Hospital to the No. 2 People’s Hospital of Yibin on August 14 and currently remains there.
It is believed that the hospital would send the baby to an orphanage when her health condition stabilizes.
Police officers are now investigating how Xiao Min, a fifth-grade pupil, had become pregnant and officers have not ruled out the possibility of raping.
The so-called left-behind children, such as Xiao Min, is a worrying social issue for China.