About the Museum of Hoaxes
The Museum of Hoaxes is dedicated to promoting knowledge about hoaxes. (Click here for opening hours, etc.) On our blog we post about whatever dubious-sounding claims come across our path on a day-by-day basis. In our archives we have hundreds of articles about the most fascinating and notorious deceptions throughout history, from the middle ages to the present.
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Giant Baby Born in China
Status: News (No reason to think it's not true)
Xinhuanet.com reports on a "giant baby" born in China's Hubei Province a few days ago. The baby looks pretty big in the photos, but the photo captions state that the baby "weighs 5.5 kilograms and is 57 centimeters tall." That would be about 12 lbs and a little under 2' tall. I think the height is more unusual than the weight. From what I understand, babies weighing 12 lbs aren't that unusual, especially if the mother is diabetic. Babycenter.com notes that: For most women with gestational diabetes, the main worry is that too much glucose will end up in the baby's blood. When that happens, your baby's pancreas needs to produce more insulin to process the extra glucose. All this excess blood sugar and insulin can cause your baby to make more fat and put on extra weight, particularly in the upper body. This can lead to what's called macrosomia. A macrosomic baby may be too large to enter the birth canal.