Mother almost throws newborn out with the toilet water

A newborn baby narrowly cheated death on Saturday, after she fell into a public squat toilet where her 36-year-old mother gave birth to her when she went to use the facilities.

The woman, surnamed Cai, went into labor 10 days early, and while on the way to hospital with her husband, stopped at a public toilet in Dongba village, Chaoyang district.

While Cai's husband, surnamed Zhang, was waiting outside, he heard a baby's cry. He discovered that his wife had given birth, and his baby daughter had been accidentally delivered into the toilet bowl.

"I could see the baby's feet moving in the hole and hear her crying when we arrived," said a firefighter with the Chaoyang district fire squad, surnamed Hou.

The rescue squad turned off the water sluice so the baby would not be flushed away, and broke apart the adjacent toilet, so as to ensure the rescue would not harm the infant.

The mother was already in hospital by the time the squad arrived, around five minutes after the initial emergency report.

It took 30 minutes for the seven team members to save the baby, and she was stiff and barely breathing when she was finally pulled out, said Hou. The baby was later sent to Huaxin Hospital in Chaoyang district for emergency treatment.

"The baby was already safe by the time I called the doctor to check on her later that afternoon," Hou said.

Cai and Zhang are migrant workers. Cai was discharged from hospital later on Saturday and was still very weak, according to the couple's neighbor, surnamed Yu, the Beijing News reported.

Physical defects to her cervix might have led to Cai's birth accident, said Chen Fenglin, president of Beijing Antai Maternity Hospital. Or she may have mistaken her labor pains for the urge to pass a stool, he noted.