Mystery Surrounds Death of 18-Month-Old Child, Investigation Ongoing

Two young parents are still trying to understand what went wrong on Friday when their 18-month-old son died.  The child was well when he woke up in the morning, and was watching television when the parents decided to give him the prescribed medication.  According to the father, Shawn Anderson, they had taken the child to the clinic for a routine checkup, and that is when the meds were prescribed.

Shawn Armstrong, Father of Deceased: “We gave my baby the pills in his mouth and he drank the water. After he was done drinking the water like twenty seconds after he started like he was fighting to breath and choking. From there we started to pat his back. My girl started to scream out and she ran out toward the neighbor for help and then the guys that live beside us came across and assisted us, try were helping us with the baby and from there when we noticed like he still couldn’t breath well we decided to rush him to the hospital but meanwhile my girl ran across to the next neighbor to assist with a vehicle and the guy that was there didn’t want to take us. I jumped on an old cycle I had gone to the house and that is how I ended up rushing my baby to the hospital. Straight in the emergency and then the doctors received him from me and connected some stuff on him and started dealing with him.”

Speaking on the matter was Minister of Health and Wellness, Kevin Bernard.  The minister did frown on the idea of giving a young baby a pill, but said he would rather not say anything further on the situation.

Kevin Bernard, Minister of Health and Wellness: “I will not want to get into the details of that because the matter is under investigation. We are trying to ascertain the full details and so until I get a proper briefing of what the investigation is leading to, then I will be able to provide an update to the media.”

Reporter: There were reports that it was due to a worm pill that he was prescribed by this hospital. Is that normal for hospitals to prescribe pills for one year old babies and babies like that? Is that normal? 

Kevin Bernard, Minister of Health and Wellness: “As I said, I would prefer to have a response until after we do the full investigation to see exactly what transpired. I will only say this as a parent; I would have never been able to do that. But at the end of the day let me not get into that further issue. So I will just say that we are investigating the matter and I prefer to respond when we finish with all the investigation when that investigation is completed and we have evidence then we will act where we need to act.”