The government dictates that only married women are legally allowed to give birth, but with marriage and birth rates having fallen to record lows in recent years, provincial authorities revamped a 2019 rule.

The strongest earthquake to hit the province in five years killed 55 in an area known as Ganzi and 38 in the city of Ya'an, local reports say.

Earthquakes are common in the southwestern province of Sichuan, especially in its mountains in the west, a tectonically active area along the eastern boundary of the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau.