There's a surprising link between some infants taken to hospital in Brazil seeking medical help and a baby taken into parliament by a Brazilian politician: they're not real.
Known as "reborn dolls", these "hyper-realistic" baby figures have taken off in the South American country, according to AP. But not everyone thinks the trend is healthy.
If you "blink" you could "mistake" them for the real thing, said the South China Morning Post. Bearing an "eerie resemblance to an actual infant", the dolls "cry, suck dummies, pee and have nails, eyelashes and veins". They first arrived in the United States in the early 1990s, "targeting adults chiefly", but in recent years their popularity has "rocketed" in Brazil. Costing from 700 reals (£91) to nearly 10,000 reals (£1,300), the dolls are used for grief therapy or parenting practice, said AP.
Online influencers have staged "birth simulations and strolls in shopping malls" with the hand-crafted baby figures, creating videos that have gone "viral". Social media has "erupted" in response to the trend, with posts either "condemning" it as "deranged" or "dismissing it as a harmless hobby", added the South China Morning Post.
Some politicians have called for "reborn" mothers to be offered psychological help, but others are less compassionate, demanding punishments for people who allegedly use their "babies" to "jump the queue for public services".
One collector, Gabi Matos, told the South China Morning Post that the criticism was sexist because "male hobbies like video games, flying kites and playing football are normalised", and "no one says that they are too old to do these things", yet women can't "take care of their dolls without people thinking we are sick". | 
