Refer China: Swedish-Adopted Woman Reunites with Birth Family in Huaiyuan After 23 Years

Abandoned in Anhui, adopted by Swedes at one, Gao reunited with birth family July 25 via DNA. Adoptive parents joined; birth mother gave jade and qipao.

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Huaiyuan

Adoption Reunion

International Adoption

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Baby Come Home

A woman born in eastern China, abandoned shortly after birth, has travelled back from Sweden together with her adoptive parents for an emotional reunion with her biological family after 23 years apart. Known in media coverage as Lisa, she was born in Huaiyuan County, Anhui Province, in 2003.

Swedish-Adopted Woman Reunites with Birth Family in Huaiyuan After 23 Years

Local media reports state that shortly after Lisa’s birth, a midwife took the newborn away with the consent of her impoverished birth parents, who believed they lacked the means to raise her. Four days later, however, the midwife abandoned the infant outside a stadium in a different city. The baby was found suffering from an inguinal hernia and taken into official care.

Placed in a children’s welfare home by local police, she was given the name Gao Jianquan — a homophone conveying the wish “in good health”. It remains publicly unclear whether the midwife faced any official consequences for her actions.

Swedish-Adopted Woman Reunites with Birth Family in Huaiyuan After 23 Years

Gao, seen here as a little girl, was placed in a children’s welfare home and given the name Gao Jianquan, which means “in good health.”

Informal, unregulated adoptions were once fairly common across parts of China, frequently driven by poverty or traditional son‑preference norms. Legal experts note that such informal arrangements do not automatically constitute human‑trafficking offences if no money changed hands, nor are they necessarily classified as abandonment when no severe psychological harm is proven.

At one‑year‑old, Gao Jianquan was adopted by a Swedish couple and grew up in Sweden. Her adoptive parents maintained open conversations about her origins and whole‑heartedly supported her wish to trace her biological roots.

In March this year, she registered with Baby Come Home, a Chinese non‑profit dedicated to reconnecting separated families. Just two months later, DNA matches successfully identified her birth relatives.

On 25 July, Gao returned to Huaiyuan alongside her Swedish adoptive parents and met her birth family for the very first time in 23 years. Her biological parents greeted her beneath a bilingual banner reading: “The most beautiful road in the world is the road home.”

Gao’s adoptive parents, who accompanied her on the trip, have been praised for their selfless support and open-mindedness.

Having spent time practising Chinese ahead of the meeting, Gao tearfully told her birth‑mother in Mandarin: “Mum, I love you. I’m so happy to see you.” Her birth‑mother presented her with a jade necklace and dressed her in a traditional red qipao, while the birth family prepared gifts of Chinese tea for the Swedish adoptive parents and their relatives. Gao has three biological siblings.

She will soon head back to Sweden to continue her master‑degree studies.

The widely‑shared reunion sparked divided opinions on Chinese social‑media platforms. Some online commentators questioned why she would seek out parents who had given her up decades earlier. Gao herself said she had come to terms with her difficult past. “Home will always be home,” she told Daxiang News. “You need to know where you come from and where your roots are.”

Many users praised her compassionate outlook and credited her stable, loving upbringing in Sweden for helping her process her story without bitterness. “She is fortunate to have such selfless adoptive parents,” one netizen commented. Others observed that she now has two caring homes, one in China and one in Sweden.

China brought nearly all international adoptions to a halt in 2024; cross‑border placements are now permitted only in narrow exceptions involving blood‑relative guardianship. Since formal overseas‑adoption frameworks were established in the early 1990s, tens of thousands of Chinese orphaned and abandoned children have been adopted by families abroad.

The country has also long worked to combat human‑trafficking crimes. Official statistics show recorded cases of trafficked women and children dropped by almost 78 percent in 2025 compared with the 2012 peak, though numerous children abducted in past decades are still unaccounted for.