The most searing images of this massive disaster are of ruined school buildings and numbed parents waiting outside as small broken bodies are lifted from the wreckage.

Young victims

China's Premier Wen Jiabao, directing the rescue operation from one of the worst hit areas near here, has focused on the young victims and urged rescuers on by saying: 'One minute could mean a child's life.'

Classrooms were packed for afternoon lessons when Monday's 7.9-magnitude earthquake ripped through southwest China and brought school buildings crashing down on top of children and teachers.

More than 40,000 people are dead or buried under rubble with time running out to save the living, with many of the victims children.

Here in Hangwang, a town of 70,000 just 50km from the epicentre, whole neighbourhoods including schools were wiped out.

Most heart-rending for rescue workers and parents have been the voices heard under the wreckage of schools that are slowly falling silent as time passes.

'Before, we could still hear their voices. If they had worked faster they would have already rescued my daughter,' said a frustrated and angry Wen Huayoung, 39, who was waiting for news of her 18-year-old daughter.

A friend, holding her hand, explained one of the reasons that made Ms Wen's heartbreak even worse: 'You know, in China, we are only allowed to have one child.'

One-child policy

Babies have become an especially priceless commodity in China since the government banned most parents from having more than one nearly three decades ago in an attempt to rein in growth of the China's population. At more than 1.3 billion people, it is the world's largest.

The policy has resulted in 400 million fewer births, according to the government, but it has also distorted the population balance leaving fewer young people to look after a swelling population of retirees. The policy has created 80 million single children in China.

Known as 'little emperors', they carry the hopes of entire families on their shoulders and are spoiled and showered with love and largesse by aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

However, though the one-child policy is applied with rigour in cities, many residents in the worst hit quake areas of Sichuan province are luckier when it comes to children.

They are residents of rural areas, with many of them from ethnic minority groups, which allows them some freedom from the population controls.

Farmers and people from ethnic minorities are allowed more than one children, with restrictions varying for different sections of the population. - AFP