A six-year-old boy died suddenly in southern Israel on Monday after he recovered from COVID-19.
Medical staff at Barzilai Medical Center, where the boy — Yosef Naim from Netivot — has been taken to, said that he contracted coronavirus a month and a half ago and had recovered since.
According to Naim's parents, he started to feel unwell Sunday, and they decided to stay at home with him instead of going to a family event.
On Monday, Naim's parents found him without a pulse in his bed and called an ambulance. He was taken to Barzilai Medical Center and despite doctors' best efforts to resuscitate him, they had to call his death.
The hospital's director and former Health Ministry director-general Prof. Hezi Levi said that the cause of Naim's death was unknown and that doctors were examining whether his death had something to do with the Omicron coronavirus variant or pediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome (PIMS) — a condition mainly targeting children that happens weeks after someone has had the virus and causes swelling throughout the body and can be fatal.
Three of the boy's sisters were also taken to the hospital on Monday suffering from shortness of breath and vomiting. Another sister has been hospitalized for several days.
Four of Naim's siblings, as well as their father, had contracted coronavirus and recovered from it.
"He was a happy and active child who did not suffer from any diseases and even had a Green Pass after recovering from coronavirus," Naim's grandfather told Ynet, referring to a document that grants access to public venues for those who have either been fully inoculated against COVID-19 or have recently recovered from it.
"He was a strong boy, jumping from place to place, like a normal child, full of energy and joy of life. He was the only son in the family. This disaster came to us from nowhere."
Mourning the passing of his son, the boy's father — Yehuda Yogev Naim — said that "we have been privileged to raise such a pure holy soul for six and a half years."