China ‘allows’ quake victims to have another child

The paper said there was no change in the family planning policy but only the existing rules were being clarified.

The quake of 8-magnitude in which the official death toll is given as 67,000 had come as a devastating blow to many parents whose only child was killed, wiping out the future generation.

China has been following the one-child norm since three decades to check its booming population and says it has helped it to reduce the growth by 400 million.

It has also ruled out revisiting the one-child norm at least for another decade. In the countryside, however, a second child is allowed if the first one is female.

Many children were killed when school buildings collapsed, provoking anger among parents who questioned the quality of structures, prompting Chinese authorities to order a probe into it.

The couples who adopt a child or baby orphaned in the quake would be allowed to have a second child by natural birth, the paper said.