Power failure kills patient at Saudi hospital

A Saudi patient on respiratory system support died after power went off at the hospital and relatives blamed the medical facility for her death, the Saudi Kabar Arabic language newspaper Kabar said on Thursday.

The women, identified only by her initials KS, was in coma at the intensive care unit at King Fahd Hospital in the southwestern province of Jazan when power went off for about 10 minutes, the paper said.

Relatives told the paper the hospital was to blame for her death because there was a delay in the operation of power generators.

"The power generators did not start automatically when power went off...there was a delay and this caused our relative's death," one relative said.

The paper quoted Dr Mohsen Tabiqi, Director of Health Affairs in Jazan, as saying power failure might not be the cause of the death. "We are investigating the incident and waiting for a report on the patient's death."

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