Soul-searching in China after toddler hit by two vans dies in hospital

A TWO-YEAR-OLD girl, twice run over by vans and then ignored by passers-by on a busy street, died yesterday, a week after the incident in China.

The Guangzhou Military District General Hospital said that Wang Yue died of brain and organ failure. “Her injuries were too severe and the treatment had no effect,” a spokesman said.

The girl’s plight has been seen as symbolic of what many in China consider a decline in morality after decades of growth and rising prosperity.

Gruesome closed-circuit footage of last Thursday’s incident, aired on TV and posted online, showed the child, nicknamed Yueyue, toddling along the street in the southern city of Foshan.

A van is then seen striking her. It slows and carries on, rolling its back right wheel over her body. In the next seven minutes, as the child lies bleeding on the road, 18 people walk or cycle past and another van strikes her before an elderly rubbish collector picks her up. At that point the girl’s mother finally appears on the scene looking for her.

Communist party chief of Guangdong province, Wang Yang, has called thei ncident “a wake-up call for everybody”.

Police have detained the drivers of both vans but have not said what charges, if any, they would face. The Southern Metropolis Daily newspaper quoted a man it identified only as a Mr Chen as saying that he had been receiving crank calls ever since someone picked him out as the 16th passer-by. He said he hadn’t noticed the injured child.