11 newborn babies killed in Senegal hospital fire 

Dakar: Eleven newborn babies died in a fire at the neonatal section of a regional hospital in Senegal’s Tivaouane, country’s President Macky Sall said late Wednesday. 

Senegal President Macky Sall announced that 11 newborns perished in a blaze that engulfed the neonatal section of a regional hospital in the town of Tivaouane.

“I have just learned with pain and consternation the death of 11 newborn babies in the fire that occurred in the neonatology department of the Mame Abdou Aziz Sy Dabakh hospital in Tivaouane,” Sall said in a statement on Twitter.

The president, who is on a state visit to Angola, offered his condolences to the heartbroken parents of the new babies.

“To their mothers and their families, I express my deepest sympathy,” he said.

Investigators believe the fire was ignited by a short circuit. 

The hospital fire is the second in less than two months to claim the lives of babies in the country.

Earlier in April, a fire broke out due to an electrical malfunction in an AC in the maternity ward at a hospital in Linguere and killed four newborn babies.