Hong Kong - A public hospital in Hong Kong Tuesday said it had lost the body of a baby boy and had set up a committee to investigate how the blunder took place.

The city's Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital said the body of the infant had gone missing last Friday. Police and the Hospital Authority had been informed, a spokeswoman said.

The spokeswoman expressed "great concern and regret" over the incident and told government-run radio station RTHK that a full apology had been given to the parents.

The committee would establish how the incident had taken place and make recommendations to avoid future incidents, the spokesman said. The circumstances of the baby boy's death were not known.

The apology comes just a day after another public hospital in Hong Kong, the Caritas Medical Centre, admitted blundering by failing to send medics to help a dying man who had collapsed on its doorstep. (dpa)