Conflict over China's Forced Abortions Heats Up

Just how much is a dead baby worth? This week, a settlement from China’s Shaanxi province put that figure at $11,200. In early June, Feng Jianmei was bundled into a van with a pillowcase over her head, then driven to a hospital by family planning officials and held down while medical staff injected poison into her pregnant belly. The forced abortion of her seven-month fetus occurred because Feng and her husband Deng Jiyuan did not have enough money to pay a $6,350 fine for contravening China’s so-called one-child policy. Such late-term forced abortions are illegal by national Chinese law, but such violent incidents are not unusual. Feng’s case, though, was different in one key respect: a photograph was posted online of the 23-year-old lying in the hospital bed with her lifeless baby girl beside her. A horrified Chinese public rallied to her cause.