Senegal hospital fire: Families mourn 11 newborn babies who died in the neonatal department | World News
Families are heartbroken after a fire at a hospital in Senegal killed 11 newborn babies.
President Macky Sall said the fire broke out in the newborn ward in the town of Tivaouane, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) east of the capital Dakar.
Mr Sall wrote on Twitter: “I just learned the painful and terrifying news of the deaths of 11 newborn babies in a fire that broke out in the neonatal ward of Mame Abdou Aziz Sy Dabakh hospital in Tivaouane.
“To the mother and their family, I express my deepest sympathies.”
One of those affected was El Hadj Gueye, whose wife Ramata Gueye passed away three weeks ago after giving birth to their son Mohamed, when she was seven months pregnant.
Now the husband’s bereaved family has learned that Mohamed was one of the children killed in the fire.
His cousin, Mustapha Cisse, said the couple had been trying for a child for seven years.
He said: “It was heartbreaking to see him lose his wife and now his child. I couldn’t even look him in the eye. If he had other children then maybe, but that’s the baby. his only”.
Diali Kaba, whose two-week-old daughter was in the neonatal ward, rushed to the hospital when she discovered the fire, but people burst into tears when they learned her daughter was among the dead.
Senegal’s Health Minister, Abdoulaye Diouf Sarr, told Senegal’s private TV channel TFM that “according to preliminary investigations, an electrical circuit triggered the fire”.
Kaba, a mother of a 10-day-old baby, reacts as she sits outside the hospital
Mr Sarr, who is in Geneva for the World Health Assembly, said he would cut his trip short and return to Senegal immediately.
Neonatal units will be investigated nationwide
Demba Diop Sy, mayor of Tivaouane, one of Senegal’s holy cities, said police and fire services remained at the hospital.
Interior Minister Antoine Felix Abdoulaye Dione said the president had ordered an investigation into the fire as well as an audit of neonatal units across the country.
Public health experts have previously warned that many underfunded, staffed African hospitals have been overwhelmed by the COVID pandemic, leaving them unable to maintain possible safety standards. acceptable.
A pregnant woman, who according to her mother is due a month, is seen walking outside the hospital after she was denied admission
Amadou Kanar Diop, a risk and security expert who inspected the unit, said the walls were burned and the staff on duty appeared to have been overwhelmed.
“It can be seen that they used some boxes of fire extinguishers,” he said.
Tivaouane is a busy road traffic hub and holy city that attracts Muslim pilgrims from across the West African country.
