ARC urges swift probes into delay in emergency medical care to Mishka, youngest Covid-19 victim in Maldives

Advocating the Rights of Children (ARC) has urged relevant authorities to conduct thorough probes into the delay in providing emergency medical care to a 10-year-old.

In a press release issued on Wednesday in connection to the first death of a child linked to Covid-19 reported on June 1, ARC called on the relevant institutions to conduct thorough, transparent and swift investigations into the delay in deploying an ambulance in response emergency calls from the family of Fathmath Mishka Mohamed.

As such, ARC expressed deep sorrow in learning of the news and sent prayers to the bereaved family and friends for their loss.

The statement goes on to read that ARC is deeply concerned due to increasing reports of systematic failures affecting the rights of children to adequate health care, over a year since the Covid-19 pandemic began sweeping across Maldives on 7 March 2020.

Healthcare authorities earlier revealed that the number of Covid-19 infections among children are also observed to be increasing in the Maldives, with a daily average of 80 children under 10 years of age. Close to 400 infants and children under a year have tested positive for Covid-19 over the past month alone.

Stressing that children are at an added disadvantage of not being eligible to receive vaccinations against Covid-19, ARC called on the government to ensure the realization of children’s right to proper healthcare, to the fullest extent, especially during such times of crisis.

Mishka, native to Kulhudhuffushi City in Haa Dhaal atoll was pronounced the youngest victim of Covid-19 in the Maldives on June 1.

The child’s family reported that they first phoned for an ambulance at 9pm, after Mishka’s health deteriorated on the night of May 31. She was reported stable before she started to get breathing difficulties, that was the seventh day since Mishka tested positive for Covid-19.

Despite the family having made several calls and begged for a quicker response, the ambulance arrived over two hours later at around 11:40pm. The family is to have cited that they had also contacted Indhira Gandhi Memorial Hospital (IGMH) on providing ambulance services. They had rejected their request as the victim was positive to coronavirus. The child’s family is to have received the same response to their repeated calls, “we have informed the medical team, they will be there shortly”.

The family is to have revealed that the child had collapsed and started bleeding from her nose and mouth by the time the ambulance arrived. She is to have gotten a heart attack and suffered internal bleeding.

It has been revealed that it took 20 minutes of CPR to revive Mishka in the Emergency Room, however by then her brain stopped due to an “unknown” period of unresponsiveness, following which she was put on ventilator support.

Mishka died 24 hours later, on June 1 and was pronounced the 170th Covid-19 victim in the Maldives.

Although she did not have any underlying medical conditions, she was diagnosed with ADHD. The Ministry of Health revealed that “immediate” changes had been brought to the mechanism on deploying ambulance services following the incident. This was revealed through Twitter.

A motion regarding the case has since been submitted to the People’s Majlis by MP for south-Mahchangoalhi constituency, Ahmed Haitham.