CHICAGO — The cause of death of a 5-year-old Venezuelan boy who died in December after falling ill at a temporary migrant shelter in Chicago was sepsis and a bacterial infection that causes strep throat, an autopsy published Friday revealed.
Jean Carlos Martínez died on December 17 as a result of sepsis due to a group A beta-hemolytic streptococcus infection, which can cause strep throat and other serious illnesses, according to the autopsy published by the Cook County coroner’s office.
Other factors that contributed to his death were COVID-19, adenovirus and rhinovirus, according to the autopsy.
The boy lived in a warehouse converted into a shelter in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago, where he suffered a medical emergency, the city reported. He was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at the hospital.
The boy’s death reignited concerns about conditions in shelters and questions about how Chicago is responding to the arrival of people who are not accustomed to the city’s cold winters and who have few local contacts.
Chicago and other cities in the northern United States have struggled to house hundreds of thousands of asylum-seeking migrants, many of whom have been bussed from Texas over the past year.
A few weeks ago, hundreds of asylum seekers were still in Chicago airports and police stations waiting to be assigned housing, and some of them were still camping on the sidewalks in front of police station buildings.
The crisis on the southern border is affecting cities because there is no infrastructure to serve so many people that they have become a public burden.
Since President Joe Biden arrived at the White House in January 2021, 9.2 million encounters of irregular migrants have been recorded, according to figures from the Customs and Border Protection Office (CBP).
Source: With information from AP
