4-Year-Old Drowns In Small Pool While Oblivious Adults Stand Nearby

A 4-year-old girl from China's southern Guangdong province allegedly drowned in an indoor swimming pool while in the presence of two adults.

Security camera footage of the incident in the city of Jieyang showed the child drowning in the pool after her inflatable rubber ring flipped over, according to Chinese state-owned media outlet The People's Daily. The footage also showed another child swimming in the pool as the incident occurred.

One woman could be seen in the video eating food as the child was drowning, while a woman in a black dress was changing the clothes of a different child, 7NEWS.com.au reported. Both of the women allegedly failed to notice what was happening to the girl.

The woman in the black dress later took the other child over to the swimming pool but still failed to observe what had happened to the victim. She then allegedly placed the newly-dressed child in the water before leaving.

Local police confirmed that the victim died in the swimming pool, but they did not comment on the identities of the two women, as per 7NEWS.com.au. It was unclear whether or not the women were staff of the facility, or relatives of the child who passed away.

The date of the incident is unknown.

April 2021 data provided by the World Health Organization, which cited a 2014 report, showed that children aged between 1 to 4 have the highest drowning rates in the world. Data also showed that drowning is the leading cause of injury death in children aged 1 to 14 in China.

A similar incident happened in Ontario, Canada over two weeks ago when an 18-month-old girl drowned in her own home's swimming pool while her mother was at the residence.

The unnamed child was reportedly found in critical condition at a house located in the Kevin Crescent and Folkway Drive area just before 2 p.m. on July 25.

She later died in a hospital in the morning of Aug. 1 after being pulled from the backyard swimming pool, Const. Steve Elms of the Halton Regional Police Service said. He added that the incident was under a coroner's investigation.

Police did not reveal how long the girl was in the pool when she drowned, but they confirmed that the child's mother was at home at the time of the incident.