A father and grandmother were sentenced to three years in prison, with a three-year reprieve, on Monday for abandoning a sick infant who died later in a hospital, Shanghai Morning Post reported.

The man, surnamed Song, in his early 20s, was told his daughter had necrotizing enterocolitis, a medical condition primarily seen in premature infants where the bowel becomes inflamed and fails, soon after the baby was delivered on April 16 at a hospital in Shanghai's Baoshan district.

Instead of heeding hospital advice and agreeing to surgery, the father consulted his 51-year-old mother and rejected the treatment out of financial concerns.

The baby was abandoned in bushes near Youyi Road on April 23 but was found by a street cleaner three days later. She was rushed to a hospital but died shortly after admission.

The father and grandmother pleaded guilty at the Baoshan district people's court.