An unsuccessful murder

Luo Cuifen of China went to the doctor because she saw blood in her urine. An x-ray revealed 23 needles deeply embedded in her body. Doctors say the needles were most likely placed there long ago by her grandparents, now deceased, who were trying to kill her as a child because they wanted a baby boy to take her place--and China's one child policy wouldn't allow both.

Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute and the first American to discover and write about China's one-child policy, told WORLD that he'd heard about such cases, but the details of this case set it apart. Of all the horrible stories coming out of China, he said, "this one is a ten, almost up there with fetal cannibalism."

Mosher said that inserting an inch-long needle through the softspot of the scalp and into the infant's brain is one way, along with simple abandonment, of getting rid of unwanted baby girls. This girl apparently survived that procedure, so her grandparents inserted 22 more needles in all parts of her body, making a "pincushion out of her."

Many of the needles had worked their way into Luo's vital organs including her lungs, liver, bladder and kidneys. Doctors hoped to remove six of the 23 needles, all of them in the woman's abdomen, in the first of several operations, which will require twenty-three doctors from China, the U.S., and Canada, in fields ranging from women's medicine to neurology orthopedics.

Although China's one-child policy is often described as voluntary, Mosher said it is still a top down program. In many part of China boys are heavily favored over girls because they are bound by tradition to support their parents in their old age, and because they carry on the family name.

Infanticide and abortions of unborn girls have created a skewed ratio between the genders, with 119 boys reported born for every 100 girls, according to official figures. Mosher says the ration in some areas is as high as 121-130 boys for every 100 girls. It's not unusual, he said, on rural playgrounds to see 25 little boys for five girls. The missing girls aren't in orphanages or adopted into families. "They're dead."

With reporting from the AP