Newborn saved from quake in Syria adopted by her aunt
JINDERIS, Syria — A baby girl born under the rubble of her family’s earthquakeshattered home has left the hospital and gone to her new home, where she was with her paternal aunt’s family Monday.
The girl had been at the hospital since hours after the Feb. 6 earthquake. She was discharged Saturday, and her aunt and uncle adopted her and gave her a new name, Afraa, after her late mother.
Afraa’s mother died in the quake along with her father and four siblings. A day after the infant arrived at the hospital, officials there named her Aya — Arabic for “a sign from God.”
Afraa’s story has been widely shared in news reports, and people from around the world have offered to help her, with some saying they would like to adopt her. However, the relatives who took her in said that, however hard their circumstances, the best place for the infant is with family.
On Monday, Afraa was being cared for by her uncle, Khalil alSawadi, who is now living with relatives in the town of Jinderis in northern Syria after his home was also destroyed in the earthquake. Al-Sawadi and his wife have four daughters and two sons, and now Afraa will be living with her cousins.
“She is one of my children now. I will not differentiate between her and my children,” al-Sawadi, who is also a cousin of the newborn’s parents, told The Associated Press on Monday while sitting cross-legged holding Afraa and surrounded by his six children. “She will be dearer than my children because she will keep the memory alive of her father, mother and siblings.”
He added that days after Afraa was born, his wife gave birth to a daughter, Attaa.
While in the hospital in the nearby town of Afrin, the director’s wife has been breastfeeding Afraa.
Judicial officials in Afrin had taken over the case of Afraa after the girl drew international attention and some people came to the hospital claiming they are related to her although they had different family names than Afraa and her mother.
For days, al-Sawadi was worried someone might kidnap her, and he visited her frequently at the hospital.
A hospital official said Afraa was handed over to her aunt’s family days after a DNA test was conducted to make sure the girl and her aunt are biologically related.
“It was sad, and some nurses wept” when she was taken from the hospital, said Dr. Hani Maarouf who had taken care of Afraa since she was brought to the facility. He added that the baby girl was in very good health when she was released.