HONG KONG • TVB actress Linda Chung (above) has welcomed a baby in Canada, about six months after she announced her secret marriage to chiropractor Jeremy Leung, said TVB Entertainment News on Tuesday.

The television report did not reveal the gender of the baby, but said the couple's first child was born in B.C. Women's Hospital & Health Centre in Vancouver.

Leung has taken leave to take care of Chung and their baby, added the report.

TVB executive Virginia Lok kept mum about the birth when contacted, said Ming Pao Daily News on Wednesday. So did actresses Christine Kuo, Eliza Sam, Grace Wong and Leanne Li, who are in the squeaky-clean Chung's close circle and have been dubbed "the Virginal Party" by newspapers.

Kuo was quoted by Oriental Daily News as saying: "The girls and I just talked and decided to wait for Linda to announce it herself when it's time."

Chung, 32, married Leung, who is 13 years her senior, late last year.

At their make-up wedding banquet in Vancouver in February this year, she said she had known him for 10 months.

She said then: "There's really such a thing as 'meant to be' in this world. Because I hadn't known him for four days and I don't know why, but I felt in my heart he was my husband and he believed that I was his wife."