On Sunday morning (Jan. 5), a 7-month-old baby boy tragically froze to death after being left to sleep outside on a balcony in eastern Russia.
The child succumbed to hypothermia after enduring -20C temperatures for five hours in the far-eastern Khabarovsk region. His parents had placed him outside to ‘sleep in the fresh air’.
Local media reports indicate that the 40-year-old mother from Nikolaevsk-on-Amur had intended to retrieve her son within a few minutes. However, she reportedly forgot about him and only remembered his whereabouts five hours later.
Upon retrieving him and bringing him inside, she found that her baby was unresponsive and efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.
The cause of death, according to Russian media, was hypothermia, which occurs when the body’s core temperature is lowered due to cold exposure.
In response to the tragic incident, the region’s health ministry issued advice via Instagram, stating that young children should not be left outside unattended.
”Always know where and with whom [your child] is,’ the ministry emphasized. ‘Do not pass by if another child is in danger – in winter, a child who is lost or injured on the street can quickly become a victim of low temperatures,’ it added.