A Russian hospital faces fines for negligence in the switching of a Russian baby and a Chechen baby after the families discovered the mix-up 18 months later, a newspaper reported yesterday.
The saga began on March 1, 2007, when a nurse in the Oryol region, south of Moscow switched the two newborns' identifying blankets. The blankets bore the names of each infant: Adlan Taysumov, an ethnic Chechen, and Nikita Androsov, an ethnic Russian.
Upon taking their sons home from the maternity ward, neither mother noticed the wrong family name on the babies' wrist bracelets. Nor did they raise any concerns about the babies' appearances, even though one was blonde and blue-eyed while the other was dark-haired with brown eyes.
The Androsovs only caught the discrepancy on the wrist band 18 months later, but then Mrs Taysumova was not prepared to give up the baby she had nurtured for nearly a year and a half. The Taysumovs only agreed to swap back the children after two DNA tests and a court order.
Meanwhile, the nurse responsible for the mix-up was fired, and the maternity ward was ordered to pay 150,000 rubles (€3,400) in damages to the Androsov family, who sued the hospital. (AFP)
Polo horses collapse, die
Twenty-one horses from a Venezuelan team competing at the US Open Polo Championship died after collapsing before a match in Florida, officials said yesterday.
The International Polo Club of Palm Beach said the Lechuza Caracas team was preparing its horses for an afternoon match when two collapsed and others began "exhibiting dizziness and disorientation."
"From the reports I've received, they came out of their trailers and they were dizzy... and began toppling over," said Terence McElroy, spokesman for the Florida Department of Agriculture. "It's my understanding that all of these horses have died, 21 in total."
Mr McElroy said 15 of the horses had been transported to a state facility in Kissimmee, where necropsies and other tests would be conducted. There was no obvious indication of what had caused the horses to collapse, he said. (Reuters)
Takeaway 'too close to school'
A London council said yesterday it had shut down a fast-food outlet because it was trading too close to a school - the first local authority in the country to take such action.
Waltham Forest Council in east London said its enforcement officers and police had ordered "Bamboo Joint" in High Road, Leytonstone, to close down.
"This fast food outlet has not got planning permission and has absolutely no chance of getting it, because of its proximity to a park and a school, so we're closing it down. On March 24, we banned all new fast-food restaurants from opening within 400 metres of schools, and we were the first local authority in the country to do that," a spokesman for the council said.
"Residents said they didn't like the litter, noise and anti-social behaviour relating to fast-food restaurants in this borough. There is a clear link to childhood obesity," he added. (Reuters)
On hunger strike over cricket
Hundreds of prisoners in an Indian jail went on a hunger strike after authorities refused to allow inmates to watch one of India's biggest cricket tournaments on cable television, officials said yesterday.
About 500 prisoners in Kolkata had requested cable TV to watch the Indian Premier League, a Twenty20 cricket tournament being played in South Africa at the weekend.
Cricket is followed by millions of people across the country.
The IPL was moved out of India amid security worries as the schedule clashed with the country's month-long election process, which began last week.
"We cannot allow cable television inside the jail compound," B.D. Sharma, a senior police officer, said.
Sharma said prisoners were only allowed to watch state-run TV and read magazines and newspapers. (Reuters)
Lucky escape from Taliban bullet
A British soldier in Afghanistan was dubbed the luckiest man in the military on Monday after a Taliban bullet pierced his helmet - and he lived to tell the tale.
Private Leon Wilson, 32, was manning a machine gun during fighting in a village west of Lashkar Gar, southern Afghanistan, on April 10, when he was shot at, the Sun newspaper in London reported.
The AK-47 bullet - which entered one side of his helmet and came out 10 centimetres away - missed his head by a few millimetres, passing through a forehead pad instead.
"They tell me I'm the luckiest soldier in the army," the reservist, who is an electrician in civilian life, was quoted as saying.
"And looking at the holes in my helmet, they must be right." (AFP)