Five months old baby's unfortunate death

How baby girl of 3 months died of suffocation ...when mother went to cook food

   A five-month old baby girl of Gammana road, Maharagama died of suffocation most unfortunately a few days ago when a piece of cloth had accidentally got entangled on her nose and the mouth at a time when nobody was aware of the incident.

   The room in which the small girl was kept had been on the 3rd floor while the kitchen where her mother had been cooking was on the 2nd floor of the same house. The mother who had fed the baby and had put the baby to sleep had subsequently gone to the kitchen and had come back to the room where the baby was  when she realised that her baby had passed away.

   Sanjeewa Sarangika (39), the mother of the deceased giving evidence had this to say: "I have a terrible sorrow about the death of my daughter. I admit that the reason for my daughter's death was a small mistake or a failing on my part."

  The deceased child was Manujana Premaratna, a 5-month old baby from 3rd Lane of Gammana road, Maharagama.

  The mother explained the incident further as follows: "The deceased is my youngest child. The 3elder children all are attending school ... when they go to school I stay at home with my youngest daughter. My husband works as a Sales Administrator. My daughter who died was born on 30th April at the Sri Jayawardenapura hospital. When she was born, her weight was 2 kgs and 500 grms. She did not suffer from any illness as such.   

  On 10th October all my 3 elder children went to school and my husband too went to work at about 7.30 in the morning. Then I prepared bran rice softened enough for my baby to eat. I fed her with a spoon and she ate all of it without any fuss.  I didn't make her drink her any water as such. Though I used to give her water on other days, on that particular day I couldn't give her any water to drink. I laid her on the tile floor with a pillow underneath and fed her with some broth and thus made her sleep.  After that I put my daughter to sleep and having taken her to the top floor ... kept her on the small bed in the bedroom. After making her recline like that on the bed, I kept 2 pillows on either side of her body. Later I kept her on a strip of chintz cloth about 2 and a half long. It was then about 8.30 in the morning. Later I went down to the ground floor to attend to my cooking duties. However I went to see my child once again at about 11.20 that morning. Though I went close to her that moment, I noticed that she was not breathing. That piece of chintz cloth had got wrapped round her mouth, nose and face. I touched her body and I found that the body had become cold ... her eyes were half opened and they were sideways. So I quickly took her to the hospital. The doctor at the OPD who examined my  child said that she had passed away. Mrs. Shrimathi Rodrigo the coroner said that the death was a result of neglect on the part of the child's mother.

   When considering this incident from beginning to end, it could be said that this was a death which occured because of the negligence of the mother. If parents who have small children would pay more attention towards their children, such unfortunate tragedies could be prevented. She also mentioned that the recent incident of death of a small child  on whose body a television set had collapsed could be cited as an example of this nature.

Information -- Pradeep Prasanna Samarakoon, Udeni Chandrasiri, Jayasingha Bandara