Sharing Needles

Doctors in southern China were planning to perform surgery on a 1-year-old boy whose parents took him to a hospital because he had been unusually fussy and learned he had six sewing needles in his body, newspapers reported Monday.

An X-ray taken revealed five needles throughout the boy's torso. He was sent for surgery at another hospital, where a second X-ray revealed four more needles, two in his scrotum, two more in his abdomen. Yet another X-ray showed a needle that had apparently been pushed through the top of the child's head.

The photographs showed the needles completely embedded inside the boy.

"We have to perform the surgery as soon as possible, but we cannot promise that we can remove all the needles," the doctor, Gu Yong, was quoted as saying.

The child's parents, migrant workers from southwest China, said they had no idea how the needles ended up in their son, nicknamed Xiao Yu. The parents, who work at a bag factory in southern China's Guangzhou city, said no strangers have come into contact with the boy.