From the BBC:
Doctors in China have discovered 26 sewing needles embedded in the body of a 31-year-old woman.
They think they were inserted into Luo Cuifen's body when she was a baby by grandparents upset she was not a boy.
Some of these needles have penetrated vital organs, such as the lungs, liver and kidneys. One has even broken into three pieces in the woman's brain.
Presumably, this was a failed attempt at female infanticide. Because of the one child policy, there is a preference among Chinese couples for boys over girls, as only boys carry on the family name. Hence, female infanticide and sex-specific abortion are still practised widely, especially in rural parts of the country.
This has led to an imbalance in the ratio of males to females. In 1997, that ratio was 131: 100 in some parts of the country, compared to 105: 100 worldwide. A World Health Organization report, published in the same year, estimated that more than 50 million women were "missing" from the female population.
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The 131:100 sounded alarmingly high so I looked around and it is *way* off. The only cite I saw online for the high number was a Telegraph article (http://tinyurl.com/2ggrhx) suitable for scaring statisticians on Halloween. 131:100 appears to be the ratio from one small region. China's male:female birth ratio is about 106:100, far from the normal ratio.
Thanks Jim. But according to this, the average is 117:100.
There has been research finding a link between these "missing women" and Hepatitis B, you can check out http://home.uchicago.edu/~eoster/hepb.pdf. That paper, by the way, puts China's figure at 107:100.
What the fuck is wrong with these people? I guess having over 10^9 citizens really devalues human life.
A bit surprise. The Chinese 'family planing' (normally called 'one child policy' in west world) was start in 1979. Luo Cuifen was born n 1976, which is 3 year before the policy start to be implemented.
The preference for boys predates the one child policy, as boys could help with farming, while girls were viewed as nothing more than another mouth to feed.
Yes Mo. Now I understand. I can't believe it! Who did it?
I have been living in China for over one year now, and I have worked with many children and parents. I witness female children being valued equally with male children. People here are simply happy to have a healthy baby. They are not so concerned with the sex of their baby.
China has even gone so far as to promote what they call the "Love Girls" movement. I grew up in America where supposedly the genders are equal...which is far from being true. I have never witnessed American society or government really doing anything to promote equal value of the sexes therre in my lifetime.
I am constantly surprised by BBC stories like this about the supposed state of things in China. More often than not, the stories I have read are mis-researched in the very least...and sometimes just way off base. I have lost much faith in the BBC as an accurate news source.
China is a large country. Just because one comes across something in one part of China IN NO WAY means that it represents the norm here.
Even the west's interpretation of China's "one child policy" is often inaccurate. And honestly, world over-population is EVERYONE'S problem to deal with. I think that other countries would do good to follow suite to an extent.