Dr. Moshe Rothschild, founder of Maayenei Hayeshua Hospital in Bnei Brak, read about the English doctor’s experience with his son and Davos’ apparent healing properties during the spring and summer seasons. He started to take small groups of children with serious skin conditions to Davos in the summer. This vacation was like a miraculous cure. Their skin cleared up from the effects of the air and the trees during prolonged periods spent in the open air. Although not a permanent cure, it provided respite for the children and for their parents, who have to care for them as they suffer.
The results were so successful that Dr. Rothschild now arranges for a group of more than 30 children from Eretz Yisroel who have serious skin conditions to spend several weeks of the summer in Davos. They rent a small hotel, which is kashered and fully equipped to accommodate the group for several weeks.
This summer, as usual, the children, who have to spend a lot of time outdoors in order for the treatment to be effective, were all thriving amid Davos’ beneficial properties. However, suddenly, one child broke out with a severe rash. His skin condition was deteriorating with no apparent reason.
The staff members were very concerned, and began testing all the food served in the hotel to find out the cause of this boy’s setback. They were astonished to find that the challos had contained milk, and the child was allergic to milk.
Like many seasonal visitors to Davos, the hotel had purchased the challos from a small local supermarket, which, especially in the high season of the summer months, caters to the tremendous influx of kosher consumers. The supermarket has an on-site bakery, and in the summer, a Yid turns on the oven and checks the eggs. Most tourists buy bread and challos from this bakery.
Rav Chaim Moshe Levy, rov of the IRG Kehilla in Zurich, does not encourage buying bread from these bakeries, which exist in several resorts in Switzerland during high season, although other rabbonim say it is ok.
There is only one heimishe bakery in the whole of Switzerland with full time hashgochah, located in Zurich. Many vacationers order deliveries from this bakery. The hotel in which these children stayed had ordered challos from this bakery. Yet the results of the food tests showed that there was milk in the challos! Had this child not broken out in a severe skin rash, no-one would have been any the wiser.
Apparently, the baker this summer was not the same baker as last year. It is not clear whether he always put milk in the bread and challos, but on this particular Shabbos, the challos were definitely milchig (and obviously not cholov Yisroel), and many other people in Davos also bought and ate these challos. This incident brought the problem to light, and it will no doubt be investigated.
