Two babies hospitalized in critical condition due to cold spell

By DIMI REIDER
A two-month-old baby was brought to the clinic of the Beduin village of Hura with a body temperature of just 31 degrees centigrade. He was evacuated to Soroka Hospital in Beersheba in critical condition. Another child was hospitalized in Haifa in critical condition, also apparently with hypothermia. The baby from Hura is the second child from the Beduin community to have badly suffered from the recent cold spell. Last week, an eight-year-old girl from an unrecognized Beduin village near Beersheba was brought to Soroka in critical condition, with a body temperature of 32 degrees. She died soon after arriving at the hospital. Unrecognized villages house several tens of thousands of Beduin in the northern Negev. Because their legal status is disputed by the state, the authorities do not provide them with electricity, waterworks or public transport.