Emotional funeral for baby dead in Sicily hospital scandal

(ANSA) - Catania, February 19 - The parents of a baby who died when she was denied a place in Sicilian hospitals attended an emotional funeral for the infant Thursday.
    Tania Egitto, mother of baby Nicole, held the infant's tiny coffin on her knees in front of the altar at the church of San Vito the Martyr in the town of Mascalucia in Catania province.
    Next to her was Nicole's father Andrea Di Pietro and the funeral was celebrated by the Archbishop of Catania, Monsignor Salvatore Gristina. Health Minister Beatrice Lorenzin told the Lower House on Wednesday that local officials did not follow the relative regulations in the case of Nicole, who expired in an ambulance on the way to Ragusa after there was officially no place for her in hospitals in the Sicilian city of Catania.
    Sicilian Carabinieri probing the case believe that hospitals might be claiming falsely to be full so as to avoid being targeted for austerity expenditure cuts. Nicole was born in a private clinic in Catania on Wednesday night, but when she developed breathing complications medical staff quickly tried to move her to a neonatal intensive care facility in the same city.
    However, they were too crowded so an ambulance then tried to rush the newborn to the intensive care facility at a pediatric hospital in Ragusa.
    The two cities lie about 105 kilometres apart by road.
    The baby died en route even as doctors in the ambulance tried to revive her.
    Hundreds of pink and white balloons fluttered outside the church during the funeral for the baby.