Heartbreak in China: A Boy's Resilience Against All Odds

Liu Hongbo, the abandoned seven-year-old (Photo: CEN)

Photos recently shared across social media have alarmed the authorities in China: the images show the seven-year-old boy in a filthy pigsty, clad in dirty clothes, his entire presence a cry for help from severe neglect. In response to the publicity, social workers were sent to his remote village in Henan Province and were horrified to discover a child who, tragically, had been raised among pigs and couldn't communicate in human language.

The child, identified as Liu Hongbo, was found wallowing in mud and filth, covered in bruises and cuts, sleeping amidst piles of old clothes in the pigpen. Initial reports indicate that he doesn't understand human speech and cannot speak. All he managed to vocalize were grunts or sounds akin to those of pigs. But the story doesn't end there.

A thorough investigation revealed that the boy's parents were unusually cruel, with a troubling history of neglect. They have five children; tragically, three died young due to severe neglect, and a fourth was adopted by a distant aunt right after birth. Liu is expected to undergo medical treatment at the local hospital before being moved to live with his aunt, where he'll begin a rehabilitation process to learn language and other human behaviors.