Little Domenico didn’t make it. This morning, Saturday 21 February 2026, the child died in the intensive care unit of the Monaldi hospital in Naples, where he had been hospitalized for over fifty days attached to a machine – the ECMO – which supported cardiac function.
His story began on December 23, 2025, when he underwent a heart transplant. The donated organ, however, had never begun to beat: it had been transported from Bolzano in inadequate conditions, exposed to temperatures that were too low and therefore unusable. Since that day the child had never woken up again.
A judicial investigation is pending into the matter with six people already registered as suspects. With Domenico’s death, the alleged crimes are destined to worsen. Crucial questions about responsibilities also remain open: someone had decided to proceed with the surgery even before the donor heart reached its destination.
In the hours before his death, his mother Patrizia Mercolino had authorized the doctors to suspend life-sustaining therapies, putting an end to an ordeal that lasted almost two months. The hospital communicated the news with an official note, expressing condolences to the family.
A shocking story that demands precise answers as to how it was possible for a child to lose his life in this way.
