Gaza’s ‘miracle baby’ dies after power blackout
Gaza’s so-called “miracle baby,” who was born via an emergency caesarian section after her mother was killed, died on Thursday.
Doctors at the hospital where she was being treated said that constant blackouts and electricity shortages had affected her incubator in the intensive care unit.
Dr Abdel Karem al-Bawab, head of the maternity ward at Nasser hospital, Gaza , told Agence France-Press Thursday that the ongoing electricity shortages played a role because “her oxygen tubes did not work properly and we had to resuscitate her more than once manually.”
The prematurely delivered baby was born by an emergency caesarean section, Friday, in the central area of Gaza. Doctors managed to deliver the baby after her mother died when an Israeli tank shell landed near the family home.
The 23-year-old mother, Shayma al-Sheikh Qanan was eight months pregnant when she died.
The “miracle baby” Shayma, named after her dead mother, had to be connected to a respirator at the maternity ward in Khan Yunis hospital, south of Gaza, due to complications during delivery.
The baby suffered oxygen deficiency in the womb after her mother’s heart stopped.
Doctors had told AFP that the baby’s vitals were stable but she would have had to stay connected to the respirator for another three more weeks.
Six days after her birth, the “miracle baby,” as she has been dubbed in the media, died in the intensive care unit which had suffered constant electricity shortages after Israeli bombing hit Gaza’s only power station.
Shayma has been buried next to her mother.
Gaza’s death toll has reached more than 1,400 however, meanwhile, Hamas continues firing rockets into Israel with a death toll of more than 60.
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