The figures put the creeps. Every 30 seconds a baby is born with some deformity in China, according to the China Daily has said no less than one in ten homes are affected.
Almost 20 million children are born annually in China, of which between 800,000 and 1.2 million arrive in the world with some type of defect and some 300,000 suffer from "very visible deformities", in total around 6 percent.
Only between 20 and 30% of children can be operated and receive a treatment that improves their quality of life, while 40% will be deformed throughout life and the rest die at birth.
When reading the news, the baby of Chinese peasants born last year with three arms that has been successfully intervened came to mind, and the case of the mermaid baby (born with two limbs together) who sadly died after several weeks under intensive care.
Obviously there is some factor, apparently environmental, that has done increase malformations in babies by 40% in the last six years, although they also point out guilty to ecological, economic factors and level of education and health.
The most affected province is Shanxi, and more especially the northern mountainous regions where there are eight large coal mines.
If we consider that, as Velsid told us, China could live a birth boom in the coming years, what is the future that awaits the number of malformed children that will be born.
The authorities will have to take action on the matter urgently.
