Newborn found in Olympic stadium Tuesday
Just days after the last flash of fireworks and opulent display of the Beijing Olympics, a more grim scene awaited a spectator in China’s now famous Olympic Bird’s Nest Stadium. On Tuesday, a woman at the paralympics (an event for athletes with physical, mental, and censorial disabilities) discovered a newborn baby girl in a toilet. She is perfectly healthy.
Due to the high profile of the child’s case, she is being cared for at a NICU in Beijing, and may have a decent future. It still breaks my heart but it’s not really her story that does it.
Though the government has not confirmed the statistics, many agencies estimate that over a million babies are abandoned in China every year. Put another way, about 114 perfectly healthy newborns are left to die every hour. Almost all of them are girls. Some of them -like the baby in the stadium – are found before they die, but they are hardly rescued.
The lucky ones end up in a private orphanage where foreigners vie to bring them home. Less fortunate ones are kept in hospitals for the mentally ill, or in state-run orphanages. It’s impossible to say what the care is like in average institutions, but journalists who have visited selected orphanages report children being systematically neglected, the sick being left to starve to death. Not because the workers don’t care, but because they can’t take care of all of them. There are also many tiny, covert rescue homes that are unsanctioned.
The Communist government enforces a one-child per family rule (with a few exceptions). There are, of course, many sides to every story, but the simple explanation here is that if a woman managed to avoid a forced abortion of an unauthorized baby, she will sometimes resort to abandoning the child. And since the culture prefers the birth of boys, first-born girls are sometimes exposed, as well. Infertile Chinese couples can adopt, but it is very difficult for families with a child to get authorization to bring home an orphan. So the majority of these ‘rescued’ babies languish and die in government sponsored institutions. In theory, foreigners can adopt a Chinese baby, but few have the money or patience to do so.
I just don’t understand. A friend of mine recently adopted from China. It took two years and more than $20,000 to bring home one of millions of little girls that the Chinese government doesn’t want to feed, much less educate.
So what can be done? I have no idea. If you are the praying type, say a prayer for the mothers, orphans and government of China. Hug your babies. And for all of our nations failings, remember there are many good things about America; be thankful you live here today.
