GUANGZHOU: A 3-year-old boy found dead and abandoned in a dry ditch in Guangzhou on Wednesday had earlier been treated for serious complications from H1N1 flu but was discharged from the hospital upon repeated requests from his family.

The boy's family has gone into hiding, but some familiar with the case say that the family could not afford the boy's hospital treatments.

The boy, surnamed Zhou who was born and lived in Xinshi town, Baiyun district, Guangzhou, started to show flu symptoms on Nov 26 and was admitted into the First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, said Xiong Yuanda, spokesman for the health bureau of Guangzhou, yesterday.