Chinese Woman 'Needled' for Being Female

Chinese doctors have found an astonishing 26 sewing needles embedded in the body of a woman which they believe were inserted when she was a baby by grandparents who wanted a grandson. Some of the needles have pierced vital organs, and a broken one lies in the woman's brain. The needles were discovered when the 31-year-old woman complained of blood in her urine, reports the BBC.

A team of 23 physicians, including five from the US and Canada, are mapping out plans to remove the needles. Doctors believe the needles were inserted just days after the woman was born. In a similar incident, six sewing needles were found in a year-old boy in Guangdong Province in China this summer. His parents said they had no idea how they got there. (More China stories.)