17 dead in stampede as over 100 million people gather at India’s Maha Kumbh festival
Ritesh Shukla/Getty Images
(ALLAHABAD, INDIA) — At least 17 people were killed and over 30 have been injured in a stampede at the Maha Kumbh Mela, one of the world’s biggest gatherings that occurs every 12 years, authorities said.
The Maha Kumbh Mela takes place every dozen years in the Indian city of Prayagraj, about 90 miles west of the holy city of Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, when an estimated 100 million people gather to bathe in holy river waters at the confluence of the Ganges, the Yamuna and the Saraswati rivers. It is considered one of the most auspicious and holy dates on the Hindu calendar.
The stampede began in the early hours Wednesday morning, according to Indian officials. The death toll and numbers of those injured is expected to rise.
It was not immediately clear what triggered the panic at the festival but Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the incident “extremely sad” and extended his condolences to those affected.
“My deepest condolences to the devotees who have lost their loved ones. Along with this, I wish for the speedy recovery of all the injured,” Modi said in a post on X.
Modi added that he is in touch with his chief minister and other related authorities regarding the incident.
Authorities are expecting more than 100 million people to visit Prayagraj for the Maha Kumbh Mela — meaning “Festival of the Sacred Pitcher” — on Wednesday for the holy dip. It is regarded as a significant and auspicious day for Hindus due to a rare alignment of celestial bodies after 144 years.
Authorities have built a gigantic tent city on the banks of the rivers to accommodate the millions of pilgrims and tourists attending the festival — equipped with 3,000 kitchens, 150,000 toilets, roads, electricity, water, communication towers and 11 hospitals, according to the Associated Press.
An estimated 50,000 security personnel are also stationed in the city to help keep the peace as well as manage the tens of millions of people in the crowds.
ABC News’ Somayeh Malekian and Prashun Mazumdar contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — Three Americans who the State Department said were wrongfully detained in China for years are on their way back to the U.S. as part of a prisoner swap, a senior U.S. official with knowledge of the deal told ABC News.
The State Department announced that Mark Swidan, of Houston, Texas, Kai Li, of Long Island, New York, and John Leung, a permanent resident of Hong Kong, would soon be “reunited with their families for the first time in many years.”
While the State Department didn’t reveal more details about the deal, a senior official told ABC News the agreement swapped three Chinese nationals who were convicted of espionage.
China agreed to lift an exit ban on an additional American who was being prevented from leaving China, according to the official. The Chinese embassy said it did not have any comment about the release.
Katherine Swidan, Mark Swidan’s mother, posted on her Facebook page an image of her son posing in a U.S. flag emboldened sweatshirt with U.S. ambassador to China Nicholas Burns and Roger Carstens the Special Envoy for Hostage Affairs on the plane.
“My son Free at Last,” she said.
Harrison Li, Kai Li’s son, said in a statement posted on X Wednesday that his father and the other hostages were scheduled to land at to Joint Base San Antonio later that night.
“We are thrilled that Kai is on his way home along with [Mark Swidan] and John Leung. Thank you, [President Joe Biden], and everyone that made this day possible at long last. Please keep bringing them home,” he said in his post.
The three Americans were arrested and held on different charges that U.S. officials and humanitarian groups said were arbitrary and unlawful.
Swidan, 49, was in China in 2012 on business looking to purchase supplies for a company in Houston as well as flooring, fixtures and furniture for his own home. He was sentenced to death in April 2019 after Chinese authorities accused him of involvement with a drug manufacturing operation. The United Nations called the detention a “deprivation of liberty.”
Swidan’s mother recorded a video message in 2022, which was played during a Congressional-Executive Committee on China hearing in September, detailing her son’s chilling arrest.
“While I was on the phone with him at his hotel, I heard a lot of commotion, and he said, ‘Hold on, mom.’ And Chinese police got into his apartment. They said, ‘We need to take you in for questioning,’ and the phone hung up,” Swidan’s mother said in the video.
In a grim promise, Swidan told her he would come home “in the box of ashes, or walking off the plane, but I will come home,” Katherin Swidan said.
Li, 62, a Shanghai-born naturalized citizen who immigrated to the U.S. 35 years ago, had an export business that redistributed products from Boeing and a subsidiary. He was detained immediately upon landing in Shanghai in September 2016, according to a family representative.
Li was sentenced to 10 years for allegedly “furnishing five state secrets to the FBI,” but his family said that those “secrets” were merely “routine communications” that Li had that were “necessary to ensure compliance with US export laws.”
In testimony before the China commission in September, Harrison Li told lawmakers that his father suffered a stroke in prison, lost a tooth and was locked in a cell by himself for three years.
“I have now spent a third of my life missing my dad. Every day, I wake up and shudder at the thought of him crammed into a tiny cell with as many as 11 other people and no climate control, experiencing the mental and physical anguish,” he told the commission.
In April 2021, Leung, 78, was arrested by Chinese authorities.
He was charged with spying and sentenced to death in May 2023 after being “found guilty of espionage, sentenced to life imprisonment, deprived of political rights for life, and confiscated personal property of RMB 500,000,” officials said in a statement translated by ABC. News
An official with knowledge of the negotiations told ABC News the Biden administration met with Chinese officials multiple times over the years to facilitate the releases.
The State Department’s announcement that three Americans are coming home from detention in China comes two months after Pastor David Lin was released after nearly 20 years in prison.
Lin’s daughter, Alice, told ABC News that her family could breathe a full sigh of relief now that others were following her father back to the United States. “We’re overjoyed,” she said.
“For us, this is our first Thanksgiving where we don’t have an empty seat at the table,” Lin said.
Biden himself recently pressed for the releases in a meeting with President Xi Jinping in Peru earlier this month on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, according to a U.S. official.
Two of the Chinese nationals who were swapped for the Americans were sentenced in the last few years for espionage, the official said.
Yanjun Xu, 44, was convicted three years ago of conspiring to and attempting to commit economic espionage and theft of trade secrets. Xu, who was the first Chinese intelligence officer to be extradited to the U.S. for trial, used multiple aliases to target specific companies in the United States and abroad that are recognized as leaders in the field of aviation, prosecutors said. He was serving a 20-year sentence.
Ji Chaoqun, 33, was serving an 8-year sentence after he was convicted in 2022 on one count of conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government and one count of making a material false statement to the U.S. Army.
Chaoquun provided an intelligence officer with biographical information on certain individuals, including engineers and scientists who worked for the Department of Defense, for recruitment by the Chinese security department, according to prosecutors.
Representatives of Li and Swidan in the U.S. Congress cheered the announcement of their constituents’ returns.
“I’m overjoyed to hear Mark Swidan is finally on his way home to Texas, just in time for Thanksgiving. Mark suffered for 12 long years in a Chinese prison for a crime he clearly did not commit,” Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said, apparently referencing drug charges that led to Swidan’s conviction.
“After nearly a decade of imprisonment by the Chinese government, Kai Li is finally on his way back to American soil and to freedom. Over the years, I have worked closely with Mr. Li’s son, Harrison, to speak directly to the highest levels of the Chinese and U.S. governments to advocate for Mr. Li’s release and safe return to his family in Huntington, New York,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement.
ABC News’ Luis Martinez, Luke Barr and Ivan Pereira contributed to this report.
(BEIT LAHIA, Gaza) – Health officials in Gaza say there is only one hospital remaining that is providing humanitarian aid services in the northern part of the strip amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.
In early October, Israel Defense Forces reportedly ordered evacuations of several regions in the north of Gaza, doctors at the hospitals told ABC News, including Beit Hanoun, Jabalia and Beit Lahia, as they work to surround Hamas fighters who are allegedly in the area.
Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia, said in a recorded message shared over the weekend on an X account by the director general of the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health that his hospital is “currently the only hospital still providing humanitarian services in northern Gaza.”
Between 50,000 and 75,000 residents are estimated to remain in northern Gaza, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
In additional comments Sunday, sent via a WhatsApp group the Gaza Ministry of Heath uses to share updates with the media, Safiya said there are currently 400 civilians inside Kamal Adwan Hospital, including babies in the neonatal unit who are in incubators and in need of oxygen. He further said that despite orders from the IDF to evacuate Kamal Adwan Hospital, there is no way to safely evacuate patients from the hospital.
“We have repeatedly requested assistance and have openly invited [Israeli forces] to see for themselves the internal workings of our hospitals so that we may continue to serve our population without fear of attack and death. These calls were rejected,” Safiya said in Sunday’s comments. “We also call on the world to witness, that if Kamal Adwan Hospital is decommissioned, there will be no way of preserving conditions of life to the remaining 75,000+ civilians in north Gaza.”
ABC News has not been able to confirm if and when Israeli forces were invited to enter Kamal Adwan Hospital, as Safiya claims, nor when the invitation was allegedly rejected.
Safiya also said that Kamal Adwan Hospital has been the target of IDF attacks as recently as Sunday.
“Direct attacks on the hospitals began with no warnings and no civilian protection permitted by the occupation, in the way of normal procedures expected in a combat zone,” he said in the Sunday message to reporters. “[International Committee of the Red Cross] and other U.N. bodies were consistently denied access to intervene. As a result, significant harm and loss to civilian life and means of preserving life resulted in these attacks on hospitals.”
“Regarding Kamal Adwan Hospital, IDF forces are operating in its vicinity but not within its premises,” the IDF said Monday in response to an ABC News request for comment, adding that the IDF “is unaware of any evacuation order of the hospital.” The IDF response did not address whether they attacked the hospital.
Israel has claimed that Hamas uses hospitals, and networks of tunnels beneath them, as bases to conduct and promote terrorist activity, and U.S. officials have backed this claim. Hamas, however, has repeatedly denied it.
Israeli forces have also insisted that they have tried to limit civilian casualties as much as possible over the course of the war.
The latest update from the Gaza Ministry of Health comes as UNICEF says children in the most northern part of Gaza have been largely unable to receive humanitarian assistance for more than 10 weeks due to the ongoing siege.
More than 96% of women and children in Gaza are currently surviving on a diet of rationed flour, lentils, pasta and canned food, which does not meet their nutritional needs, according to UNICEF.
“Gaza must be one of the most heartbreaking places on earth for humanitarians. Every small effort to save a child’s life is undone by fierce devastation,” UNICEF Communication Specialist Rosalia Bollen said during a press briefing at the Palais des Nations in Geneva on Friday.
“For over 14 months, children have been at the sharp edge of this nightmare, with more than 14,500 children reportedly killed, thousands more injured,” she continued. “As we approach the end of the year, a time when the world strives to celebrate family, peace and togetherness, in Gaza the reality for over a million children is fear, utter deprivation and unimaginable suffering.”
Since Hamas launched its surprise terrorist attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, more than 1,700 Israelis have been killed and more than 8,700 have been injured, according to Israeli officials. In Gaza, more than 45,300 people have been killed, and more than 107,700 people have been injured, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
(APPLETON, WI) — A young Wisconsin man died from an asthma attack after the price of his inhaler skyrocketed nearly $500, according to a lawsuit filed by his family.
Cole Schmidtknecht, 22, suffered from asthma, a chronic disease, that he treated with an Advair Diskus inhaler that allegedly cost him no more than $66.
That cost changed last year when OptumRx, a subsidiary of United Health Group, stopped coverage for the inhaler Schidtknecht used for a decade, the lawsuit alleges.
On Jan. 10, 2024, Schmidtknecht went to his local Optum Rx-Walgreens pharmacy in Appleton, Wisconsin, expecting to fill his usual prescription when he was advised by Walgreens that his medication was no longer covered by his insurance and would cost him $539.19 out of pocket, according to the lawsuit.
He was given no notice and, the lawsuit said, Walgreens did not offer him a generic alternative “and further told Cole that there were no cheaper alternatives or generic medications available.”
Unable to afford the inhaler, the lawsuit alleges he left the store without it. “Over the next five days, Cole repeatedly struggled to breathe, relying solely on his old ‘rescue’ (emergency) inhaler to limit his symptoms, because he did not have a preventative inhaler designed for daily use,” his family claims in the lawsuit.
On Jan. 15, 2024, Schmidtknecht was driven to an emergency room by his roommate for a severe asthma attack, but “became unresponsive and pulseless in the car,” before reaching the ER according to the lawsuit.
After receiving cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in the ER, Schmidtknecht spent days in an intensive care unit and never woke up. He was pronounced dead on Jan. 21 after life-supporting care was stopped, the lawsuit states.
His parents are now suing Walgreens, its parent company Boots Alliance and Optum Rx, the pharmacy benefits manager, for negligence.
“Defendant Optum Rx had a duty to not artificially inflate prescription drug prices for medications such as Advair Diskus for insured patients, including Cole Schmidtknecht, making them so unaffordable that patients could not obtain the medications their physicians prescribed,” the lawsuit said.
In a statement to ABC News, Optum Rx said that Schmidtknecht filled a generic Albuterol prescription, an inhaler used to stop asthma attacks, on Jan. 10, 2024, with a $5 copay, adding that the same drug was previously filled in October 2023 by him.
The prescription service said that it “also has available clinically appropriate options and formulary information” for when medication is not covered by a provider.
In the lawsuit, Schmidtknecht’s family claims “Walgreens Defendants failed to exercise reasonable care in that they knew, or should have known, of the unreasonable risk of harm to asthmatic patients, including Cole Schmidtknecht, that would result from their failing to provide him with Advair Diskus or a medically equivalent alternative medication at an affordable price at the point of service.”
Walgreens declined to comment on the litigation when ABC News reached out for a comment.
Just a few months after Schmidtknecht’s death, the makers of Advair, GSK, announced in March 2024 that starting January 2025 the most people will pay out of pocket for their inhaler is $35 a month.
GSK joined other manufacturers of inhalers in capping the out-of-pocket cost for inhalers, something Sen.Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who chairs the HELP Committee commented on at the time.
“The three largest manufacturers of inhalers in the world have all committed to cap the cost of inhalers in the United States at no more than $35 at the pharmacy counter,” he said.
Dr. Jade Cobern, MD, MPH, who is board-certified in pediatrics and general preventive medicine, recommended individuals who suddenly see an increase in medication cost or can no longer afford it speak to their provider about alternatives, check for current discounts to lower out-of-pocket costs by using an app like GoodRx or reach out to the manufacturer for assistance or possible rebates.
“If you are struggling to breathe it is imperative that you seek medical help immediately through your doctor, by going to the emergency room or by calling 911,” Cobern said.