People search through rubble following an earthquake in Adana, Turkey February 6, 2023. (Credit: Ihlas News Agency via Reuters)
ISTANBUL — A mother has been reunited with her baby in southern Turkey after a DNA test confirmed it was her daughter, almost two months after a devastating earthquake ripped through the region, the country's family ministry said.
The three-and-a-half-month-old "miracle baby," named Vetin, was pulled out of the rubble of a building in the province of Hatay more than five days after the Feb. 6 quake with no health problems, a ministry statement said.
The minister handed her over to her mother Yasemin Begdas at a hospital in the city of Adana, 54 days after the disaster.
"Reuniting a mother and her child is one of the most precious tasks in the world," Minister of Family and Social Services Derya Yanik was quoted as saying.
After initially being cared for in an Adana hospital, the baby was taken by the presidential plane to be cared for by authorities in Ankara.
A DNA test revealed that Yasemin was her mother and the baby was flown back to Adana, where the reunion took place at the hospital.
More than 56,000 people were killed by the Feb. 6 earthquake and subsequent tremors, with 50,000 of those in Turkey and the remainder in Syria.
The baby's father and two brothers died in the quake, the ministry statement said.