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Girl, 5, dies after mother leaves her in parked car for 4 hours at Malaysia hospital

2024-02-01 00:00:00.0 海峡时报-亚洲原网页

A five-year-old girl died after her mother inadvertently left her in a parked car at Hospital Shah Alam in Selangor, The Star reported on Feb 1.

The mother, who is a staff member at the hospital, had picked up her daughter from a daycare centre at about 2pm on Jan 30. She forgot that her child was asleep in the back seat and left the vehicle with the engine off, the report cited a police statement as saying.

It was only when her husband called her at about 6pm that the 34-year-old mother realised her daughter was still in the car.

The child was found unconscious and was taken to the emergency department of Hospital Shah Alam. Despite efforts by the medical staff, she was pronounced dead.

A post-mortem was carried out on Jan 31, with results pending further laboratory tests.

Assistant Commissioner Mohd Iqbal Ibrahim, the Shah Alam district police chief, noted that there were no signs of external or internal injuries on the child’s body. The incident is being investigated under the Child Act.

The authorities have urged the public to be vigilant when transporting children, to prevent such incidents.

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This case comes almost three months after a similar incident in Selangor, where a two-year-old child died after her mother, who was preoccupied with her schedule, left her in the car for more than seven hours.

The mother, who was in her 30s, drove two of her children to school before arriving at a daycare centre to drop off her two-year-old daughter on Nov 8, 2023. According to a police statement, she was settling some online business transactions while parked near the daycare centre and forgot to drop off the child.

There were two other similar incidents in Malaysia in October 2023.

On Oct 25, a 16-month-old girl died after her father left her in a car for hours. The incident took place at a public university in the east coast state of Terengganu.

On Oct 5, an eight-month-old girl died after being left in a car for 10 hours in Kuala Lumpur.

The mother, who was a doctor at a hospital, had placed her daughter in the rear seat to take her to a nursery. However, she did not drop off the child and went straight to work, thinking she had already taken her daughter to the nursery.