During the seven-day Spring Festival holiday, 98 babies were born in the hospital, 10 each day on average, according to Song Shurong, an obstetrician with the hospital.
"There were 14 births on the third day of the Lunar New Year," Song said. "We were so busy that we could barely break for a drink or to use the toilet."
Song said that none of the hospital's 46 beds were vacant, so they had to add extra ones down the hallway.
"We had 6,000 new babies in 2014, the year of the Horse," Song said. "But this year is likely to go way beyond that."
Similar situations can be found in provincial maternal hospitals in the northwestern province of Gansu. According to hospital official Yang Xiumin, about 16,000 new babies will be born this year, up 15 percent from 2014.
Medical institutions, too, are feeling the pinch.
In Beijing, the capital's first-class midwifery institutions were all over booked for 2015, according to Beijing's health authorities. The 2016baby boom is likely to exert even more pressure this year.
Meanwhile, many of this year's pregnant women are older mothers, thanks in part to China's lift of the one-child policy at the end of last year, bringing extra challenges for medical staff.
China, however, does not have enough maternal staff. According to figures released by the World Health Organization, there are only three midwives for 1,000 pregnant women in China.
The southwest municipality of Chongqing needs almost 10,000 midwives, according to Li Hongyu, head nurse at Chongqing's Southwest Hospital.
In the Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital in the northeastern city of Changchun, officials have increased the weekly working hours of each medical staff by 50 percent to cope with the spike in pregnancies.
FINDING A WAY OUT
Amid mounting pressure, authorities are trying to find a way out.
In Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, local hospitals have increased beds and hired more staff.
Harmonicare Medical Group, China's largest private obstetric hospital, has upgraded its institutions in Beijing and central China's Wuhan City by adding more beds and recruiting more staff. The group owns 11 hospitals for women and children across China.
"Besides the efforts, the government should step up medical investment to ease the pressure," said Wei Hongwei, an official with Guangxi Maternal and Child Health Hospital.
