9-Month-Old Baby Dies After Allegedly Being Branded With Hot Iron By Healer To Cure Illness

A 9-month-old baby died in India after a healer branded the child with a hot iron rod to cure his fever.

The incident took place Friday in the eastern state of Odisha. According to local media reports, the child, identified only as Rupesh, was suffering from fever, cold and a cough for a few days.

A worker from a health non-profit visited the child's home and told his parents to take the baby to the hospital. However, the family decided to go for traditional healing practices to cure the child, Prameya News reported Sunday.

A female traditional healer came to their house and branded the child with a hot iron rod. The non-profit worker then called an ambulance after learning about the child's injuries. As his health condition deteriorated, the baby boy was rushed to Hatabharandi community health center (CHC).

However, the family members allegedly took Rupesh away from the CHC without informing anyone. The child was again treated with hot iron branding, which left him with serious burn injuries.

"He was suffering from fever and cough. We took him to Umerkote, Nabarangpur and Koraput. It was when his cough did not subside that we decided to go for branding,” the child's sister, who has not been identified, told Odisha TV.

“Though I advised them to take their son to the hospital, they went on treating him with ahot iron. However, I managed to persuade them and admitted him to the hospital on Wednesday. But they left the hospital without informing anyone, including me,” the non-profit worker said.

The superstitious practice of branding with a hot iron rod to cure ailments has claimed the life of the child, local media reports said. Several people in India, especially in the rural areas, still rely on occultists and local healers to cure illnesses rather than going to a doctor.

In a similar incident last year, a 5-month-old baby died after her mother allegedly branded the child with a hot iron to cure her illness. The incident took place in the western state of Rajasthan. The police said the child had been unwell for a month, and was unable to eat anything or drink milk properly. The victim's parents believed the child was having some stomach issues. The woman tried to contact a local occultist for the child's treatment, but he was out of town. The mother branded the baby with the hot iron, thinking it would help her daughter recover from the illness. However, the child died at a hospital, where she was taken after her health deteriorated.