WASHINGTON — Two migrant children who died in the custody of U.S. Customs and Border Protection in late 2018 could have been saved had agents taken the appropriate steps to ensure their medical care, according to letters from a pediatric physician and professor at Harvard Medical School that were submitted to Congress on Wednesday and obtained by NBC News.
Felipe Gomez Alonzo, 8, and Jakelin Caal, 7, both from Guatemala, died from the flu and sepsis respectively while in U.S. Border Patrol custody shortly after crossing into the U.S. with their fathers in December 2018.
At the time, Customs and Border Protection said the remote locations in which the children arrived and the arduous journeys they had endured complicated their medical care, relieving border agents of any blame in their deaths.
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Oct. 21, 201906:11But letters to the parents of the children from Fiona Danaher, a pediatrician at Massachusetts General Hospital and an instructor at Harvard Medical School, indicate more could have been done to save their lives.
Danaher reviewed witness statements and autopsy reports for both Gomez Alonzo and Caal.
In writing to Gomez Alonzo's father, Danaher said, "His clinicians missed important clues about the severity of his illness, and they prescribed the wrong medication to treat him."
Click here to read the letter.
Danaher wrote to Caal's father, Mr. Caal Cuz: "Unfortunately, the border patrol agents at the forward operating base where Jakelin was apprehended did not conduct sufficient screening to identify her illness before the first bus left for the border patrol station."
Click here to read the letter.
Danaher is scheduled to testify at a House Homeland Security Committee hearing on Wednesday on CBP's medical care for children in its custody.
CBP did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
