WHAT KILLED Christina?
GRANVILLE, St James
Family members and close friends are baffled over the sudden death of 15-year-old Grade 10 student of Irwin High School, Christina Ferguson.
Ferguson died at the Cornwall Regional Hospital yesterday, after a brief battle with a mysterious ailment.
Relatives recall that Christina lost her appetite as well as her speech prior to her passing.
Diagnosed with an inflamed liver, she reportedly ranted and writhed with excruciating pain during her short illness.
“She was screaming and kicking.
From Sunday she was not talking and she don’t eat,” said Christina’s mother, Cassandra Evans.
At first, the family members were of the view that Christina’s ailment stemmed from one of two vector-borne diseases, namely the lethal dengue haemorrhagic fever or leptospirosis.
” I took her to the Cornwall Regional Hospital after 10 Sunday night and they took blood test and stuff like that. However, they did not get any result, but they were looking on two things, dengue fever or leptospirosis. But they were not sure which of them but that was what they were looking at. So I kept visiting and waiting for the result from the laboratory,” a tearful Evans argued.
But, yesterday the results from the Cornwall Regional Hospital’s ‘s laboratory ruled out dengue.
“The blood test has turned out negative for dengue, however further tests are being carried out to determine the cause of death,” said Clinton Pickering, public relations manager for the Western Regional Health Authority.
In the meantime, councilor for the Granville Division Michael Troupe disclosed that he will be calling upon the Ministry of Health for a probe into the case.
” I am going to order a probe into the death of the child. I am not going to await the results. I have already contacted the mayor and he is contacting Kingston. So as soon as I get an answer from him later I will order a probe into the incident. I am going by the school to find out what happened. I am going to speak to the school and the vendors there,” said Councillor Troupe during a visit with the bereaved family members yesterday.
Troupe has since written to Minister of health, Ruddy Spencer, expressing concern over the incident.
“Over the past days three persons from the community of Retirement, Granville, St James have exhibited symptoms of dengue and leptospirosis, resulting from which, one individual has succumbed to this illness, and others are now hospitalised. The situation is causing grave stress and burden on the area and citizens are restive and are in a panic mode,” a portion of the letter read.
According to Christina’s mother, on Monday last week, while still at school, her daughter begun to complain of not feeling well.
However, ” after eating something” she said she felt better.
But the following day she began to complain of pain in her stomach and head.
Subsequently, on Wednesday she was taken to see a medical doctor who inquired if “she was eating on time” and who diagnosed her illness to be sinus related. The student was being treated with a prescribed medication.
However, the bereaved mother was shocked after receiving a call Sunday night from Violet Tomlinson-, with whom her daughter lived- informing her that her daughter’s condition was becoming worse.
She was subsequently taken to the Cornwall Regional Hospital where she succumbed to her illness yesterday morning.
Tomlinson, Christina’s caretaker, expressed doubt that Christina contracted a disease from school.
” I don’t feel that she contracted the disease from the school because as far as Christina told me they are not allowed to buy from outside,” Tomlinson declared.
Yesterday, Irwin High’s vice principal, Berlyn Roper declined to comment on the incident as “the school was not officially informed by the family of her death”.
Last week the Observer West reported the death of a 16-year-old St James girl who died at the Cornwall Regional Hospital (CRH) from a suspected case of dengue haemorrhagic fever.