Gaza: ‘Miracle baby’ born after mother’s death dies due to power cut

The Gazan ‘miracle baby’ who was saved from her killed mother’s womb has died in an incubator in a hospital, suffering from power shortages inflicted by Israeli strikes. Hospitals now hope that a brief truce will ease the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.

The world continues to mourn the death of the Gazan “miracle baby”, who died in an incubator in a hospital that is suffering from power shortages inflicted by the IDF bombardment.

Prematurely delivered from the womb of her dead mother, the “miracle baby” Shayma died in Khan Yunis hospital in southern Gaza after five days of fighting to stay alive. She died in an intensive care unit which suffered blackouts after Israeli shelling knocked out Gaza’s only power station.

Dr Fadi Al-Khrote, one of the doctors who saved the baby, told Al-Jazeera that Shayma’s mother, 23-year-old Shayma al-Sheikh Qanan, had been clinically dead for ten minutes before the surgery to save the baby finished. The child was a “miracle”, he said, as the baby was deprived of oxygen for some time.



 

“The baby suffered an oxygen deficiency in the womb after her mother’s heart stopped,” Dr Abdel Karem al-Bawab, head of the maternity ward at Nasser hospital, told AFP Thursday, adding that Shayma was connected to a respirator in the maternity ward.

“This deficiency caused the baby to asphyxiate unexpectedly, rendering her brain dead,” he said of the tragedy, which struck this Wednesday.

“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.”

 

At the time of the “miracle” Shayma’s grandmother Mirfat Qanan said it was a tragedy to lose her daughter.

“My daughter Shimah is dead, but I now have a new daughter,” she said as quoted by the Metro. Now Mirfat is battling a new tragedy, just like thousands of other Palestinian families suffering from IDF operation “Protective Edge” that has ravaged the Strip for 24 days.

Hundreds of Twitter users continue to comment on Shayma’s death, mainly blaming Shayma’s death on the lack of power caused by Israeli force.

 

Shayma’s death, who according to reports was buried next to her mother, follows Tuesday’s destruction of Gaza’s only power plant leaving many of the Palestinian territory’s 1.8 million people without electricity.

Israeli indiscriminate shelling has brought world criticism as the death toll soars in the Gaza Strip.

A spokesman for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), could not contain his tears during a TV interview in the aftermath of Wednesday’s fatal attack on a UN-run school, used as a shelter. Twenty people were reportedly killed after a shell hit the UNRWA school in Jabalia, Gaza, where 3,300 people had been taking refuge.

Sources: RT