LAST week, the city and nation were shocked by news that a 21-year-old waitress apparently killed her baby after giving birth in a restaurant restroom in Shanghai’s Pudong New Area.

Nobody knew she was pregnant until she delivered the baby alone on March 14. Fearful of her parents’ outrage, she strangled the infant, according to police. She was discovered by a colleague and sent to the hospital.

The woman now is likely to face a murder charge, if deliberate killing can be proved.

This is not an isolated case of an unwed young woman delivering a baby alone in a restroom in Shanghai.

On January 8, a 15-year-old schoolgirl gave birth to a baby boy in a restroom at her school in northeast Shanghai’s Hongkou District. The infant died in hospital.

In February, a young woman delivered a baby in a public restroom outside the Hongqiao Road Metro Station in Changning District. She was rushed to the hospital where she pleaded with police not to inform her parents.

Last September, an 18-year-old woman threw her newborn son from a third-floor window in her dormitory restroom in Shanghai where she had given birth. Incredibly, she was not aware of her pregnancy until she gave birth and out of shock tossed the infant out — another example of the urgent need for medically accurate sex education.

The woman has been charged with murder.

While many people are shocked by the cold-hearted killings, experts are less surprised and very concerned with the soaring number of unintended pregnancies in unprepared women, many of them in their teens.

The National Research Center for Family Planning reported in 2012 that 13 million abortions were performed nationwide at licensed facilities; around 50 percent were for women under age 25.

The Shanghai Family Planning Commission reported that in 2012, 31.6 percent of abortions were performed for unwed mothers, and of those, 80 percent were migrants.

The Teen Pregnancy Hotline (6587-6866) at Shanghai 411 Hospital, the city’s first such hotline, has received more than 43,000 calls in the past six years.

It helped around 4,800 pregnant girls and young women to obtain abortions.

Underage girls are usually strongly advised to have parental company (although it’s not a must) at public hospitals; many parents actually approve and encourage abortions for young girls. Parents’ signature is required if the girl needs to be hospitalized.

It’s different at unlicensed clinics, where abortions are cheaper, and parents never have to know.

While there is still social stigma attached to perceived immorality resulting in pregnancy, the issue in China does not involve religious issues and passions as it does in the United States.

Busy hotline

The cost at a public hospital or licensed clinic ranges from 1,000 yuan (US$161) to 2,000 yuan.

Reputable facilities do not advise abortion after 10-14 weeks, though labor can be induced up to 24 weeks.

The hotline — launched in 2005 — provides free consultations about sex, HIV and safe sex, how pregnancy happens, various contraceptives, the morning-after pill, and other topics.

At peak times, such as holidays and summer vacation, operators can get as many as 60 calls a day, according to Dr Cheng Xiaomei who is in charge of the hotline. Last summer there were more than 1,300 calls during the two-month vacation, including 400 from juveniles.

“It worries me greatly that the number of pregnant girls keeps soaring in recent years and they are getting pregnant at a younger age,” Dr Cheng tells Shanghai Daily.

Around 30 percent of the pregnant girls who call are 14-19 years old and the youngest was only 12, she says.

Obviously, most of the girls know little or nothing about contraception. When they realize they are pregnant, many are panicked and terrified. Few turn to parents or teachers for fear of parental fury, teachers’ contempt and social ostracism.

Given the lack of medically accurate sex education at home or at school, some girls are not aware of their pregnancy and when they are aware, they have missed the best time for termination.

Jessica Liu (not her real name) has never told her parents that she had an abortion when she was 19 in college. Her parents were getting divorced and she felt distressed and abandoned.

She seldom went to class and spent most of her time with the wrong “friends.” One night she got drunk and was raped.

She quickly realized she was pregnant and told no one except a friend who was not close to her social network. That friend accompanied her to a clinic where the pregnancy was terminated.

“I was afraid of letting anyone know and afraid the news would break my parents’ heart. I couldn’t take the disdain from my classmates. All I wanted to do was get rid of the baby as secretly as possible,” she tells Shanghai Daily.

She isolated herself from her old circle and anyone who might know that she was raped. She dropped out of classes and failed to graduate.

Today she is working as a secretary at a private company.

Lack of proper sex education is a major reason for rising numbers of unwed mothers, says Dr Cheng, adding that girls are becoming sexually mature earlier than in the past.

Talking about sex generally remains taboo in China, however, and many parents are embarrassed to discuss it with their children and feel that they are, in a way, protecting their children by not telling them.

More schools offer sex education, but many parents can opt out and are strongly opposed since they equate knowledge about sex with encouragement to have sex.

“Many parents are still playing ostrich, believing that their children won’t have sex as long as they do not tell them how to do it — which is absolutely not the case,” says Shanghai psychologist Lin Yizhen.

Avoiding discussion of sex leads girls and boys to believe sex is shameful and should never be discussed with their parents, says Lin. Therefore, pregnant girls naturally do not turn to their mothers for help, for fear of punishment. The social stigma attached adds to the pressure.

“With these beliefs, some girls would rather risk their lives getting abortions at unlicensed clinics, or simply keep the pregnancy secret until birth,” says Lin.

It is paradoxical that in many countries, including China, if girls can easily get abortions at licensed clinics, there might be more reckless sex. But if they cannot get abortions, the number of young, unwed and unprepared mothers will soar. If the government supports unwed mothers, more children might well be born out of wedlock; but if there’s no support, there are likely to be more abandoned and dead babies.

“This might be like giving needles to drug addicts,” Lin says, referring to the question of lesser harm.

Most girls can’t handle the responsibility and so more newborns are abandoned, killed or given over to traffickers.

“It is time for us to rethink about our major goal. Is it more feasible to stop people from having sex or reduce the number of unwed mothers,” asks Lin.