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A 7-year-old Guatemalan girl who died in the United States last December was suffering from a bacterial infection so advanced that she would probably have been visibly ill for many hours, said several doctors who reviewed a report of the disease. Autopsy recently published on his death. .
By the time the girl, Jakelin Caal Maquin, arrived at the children's hospital with convulsions and breathing difficulties, she was already suffering from serious blood abnormalities, according to a part of the report that summed up her condition at the ward. Emergency of the children's hospital. at the Memorial Campus of Providence Hospitals.
The new findings were released Friday by the El Paso County Medical Examiner's Office. Customs and border protection officials and the girl's family's lawyers wondered whether the severity of her infection – a common streptococcal bacterium – should have been recognized and whether it should have been taken faster for medical care.
"It takes hours to progress," said Dr. Lee Sanders, chief of general pediatrics at Stanford University.
Jakelin and his father, Nery Gilberto Caal Cruz, spent about eight hours in a remote area of the New Mexico border following their arrest by border patrol agents for illegally entering the United States with a group of 163 migrants. They were not placed in the first bus bound for the Lordsburg Border Patrol Station, according to a schedule published last December by the Customs and Border Protection Service.
Officials said that Mr. Caal signed a form after being apprehended, testifying that his child was in good health. However, the lawyers representing Mr. Caal said the form was in English, which Mr. Caal did not mention.
Many migrants interviewed in recent weeks after being released from border patrol custody said that they or their children were sick but that they had not revealed the disease, for reasons ranging from fear that it will slow down their treatment to a lack of knowledge of medical care. available. Pediatricians said it would be difficult for border police officers with little or no medical training to judge the health status of a child.
Congressman Raul Ruiz, a California Democrat who is an emergency physician, said in an interview that the new report underscored the need for standardized medical checks at the border.
"It is clear that there has been no significant observation or evaluation of this child," he said. "It is the legal responsibility of C.B.P. to meet the humanitarian needs and health needs of the children in their care while being detained ".
This duty is made more difficult by the fact that migrants move through hard-to-reach areas, where medical resources, including ambulances, are scarce.
The agency said Mr. Caal had informed border patrol officers that his daughter was sick and was vomiting only just before they left the remote area. Even so, the girl did not receive any medical attention until the bus arrived at the station, about an hour and a half later, where border police officers trained in the maintenance of medical technicians They examined him and called an ambulance. She was then flown to El Paso Hospital.
After the death of Jakelin, and a few weeks later, the death of another Guatemalan child, Felipe Gómez Alonzo, led the federal agency to improve the assessment of medical problems in children and increase the number of professionals in the health. Congress has set aside funds for this year.
Lawyers for the girl's family have called for an independent investigation and said Friday in a statement that while the autopsy report "clarifies the cause of Jakelin's death, many issues still need to be addressed."
"The findings of the report suggest that Jakelin's chances of survival would have been improved with previous medical intervention," they said in a statement. According to the autopsy, Jakelin's death is due to streptococcal sepsis, a potentially life-threatening reaction to infection.
Mr Caal said Friday night that although he was informed of the publication of the autopsy report, he had not seen it yet.
"I wanted to know what had happened," he said, phoning from Philadelphia where he lives with relatives. He was concerned that the report could somehow affect his immigration case.
The agency, which defended the handling of the case, did not comment on the new report.
At a press conference on Wednesday announcing further increases in the number of illegal border crossings, Kevin K. McAleenan, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner, warned that the dangers persisted.
"With 55,000 families, including 40,000 children, expected to enter the process this month, we are doing everything in our power to simply avoid a tragedy in a PC. installation, "he said." But with these numbers, with the types of diseases we're seeing at the border, I'm afraid it's only a matter of time. "
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