Oh baby! China hospital puts men through pain of childbirth

SHANDONG, China, Nov. 21 (UPI) -- Brave fathers-to-be are getting shocking lessons at a pioneering Chinese hospital in what it feels like for women to give birth.

A nurse at Hangzhou Aima maternity hospital in China's Shandong province sends an electric current to a pad placed above the abdomen of volunteers. Over five minutes, the strength of the current is increased, causing men to "writhe in agony," according to witnesses.

One man compared the pain to feeling as if his "heart and lungs were being ripped out."

Organizers hope the experience will make men more sensitive to their partners while they labor. It's an unusual exercise in a nation where men often don't attend the birth of their children.

Hospital administrators emphasize that the experiment causes no lasting damage to men. They also note that there's no real comparison between the "pain experience camp" and women's suffering during the much longer-lasting agony of childbirth.

Some men couldn't hack it and bailed out mid-shock.

"I thought giving birth to a baby was something natural, something really normal that women could get through," one nearly-dad told the BBC. "After this I realized it's not easy giving birth. It's just painful."