MADRID: A young girl died during rescue surgery to save migrants who tried to reach the Spanish Canary Islands on a small ship, Spain authorities said on Wednesday.
Emergency services for the Canary Islands said the girl suffered from respiratory failure before the rescue helicopter that took her and two adults could reach the hospital.
Rescuer believes that he is around 5 years old.
The girl is one of 35 migrants in a small craft located near the merchant ship on Tuesday while adrift of the East Atlantic Ocean.
Jose Juan Tejera, an emergency worker, told Spanish public broadcaster that the group had traveled for 17 days.
The dangerous sea route from West Africa to the Canary Islands has become an important entry point for migrants who run away from poverty and violence in hopes of reaching Europe.
More than 5,700 migrants have arrived in the archipelago so far this year, compared with 2,600 in the same period in 2020.
At least 178 migrants have died so far this year trying to reach the Spanish Islands, according to the United Nations International Organization for Migration.
By 2020, the migrant project that lost the organization recorded the peak of 749 deaths on the route, despite receiving more reports on shipwrecks that could not be verified.