2 children branded with hot iron in Keonjhar, hospitalised

Keonjhar: A newborn and a toddler were admitted to Keonjhar district headquarters hospital on Saturday night when their condition deteriorated after being branded with hot iron.
The children were reportedly suffering from swollen stomach and fever and local quacks (Dishari) advised branding treatment to the parents.
A seven-day-old baby boy sustained serious burn injured after being treated with hot iron by his grandmother at Baharaguda village under Harichandanpur block. The baby’s umbilical cord had swollen. In another incident, an 18-month-old baby girl of Kusumita village was meted with similar inhuman treatment by a local village quack to cure swelling of her stomach on Saturday afternoon.
“The baby girl was brought to the hospital in a critical condition. She has tested positive for malaria because which her stomach had swollen but her parents misunderstood and branded her with hot iron. Her condition is stable now,” Kishor Kumar Prusty, child specialist of the hospital, said.