Babies Found Along Chinese River; Hospital Staff Arrested

Mortuary workers were supposed to dispose of bodies
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Mar 30, 2010 6:23 PM CDT
Babies Found Along Chinese River; Hospital Staff Arrested
Some 21 babies washed up along a river in eastern China.   (AP Photo)

The bodies of 21 babies, some with hospital identification tags around their tiny ankles, washed ashore on a river in eastern China and two mortuary workers were detained for allegedly dumping them. News footage shows the babies—at least one of whom was stuffed in a yellow plastic bag marked "medical waste"—strewn along a dirt riverbank near a highway overpass. A few wore diapers. All were caked in mud.

Hospital ID tags on eight of the babies helped investigators trace them back to the Affiliated Hospital of Jining Medical University, Xinhua reported. Hospital mortuary workers Zhu Zhenyu and Wang Zhijun were sacked and taken away by police, Xinhua said, citing Jining government spokesman Gong Zhenhua. The babies' families had paid the pair to dispose of the bodies, but they instead dumped them at the river. (More China stories.)

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