An eight-year-old boy from Guatemala died in government custody early on Tuesday, US immigration authorities said, marking the second death of an immigrant child after being detained at the border between Mexico and the United States this month.
US Customs and Border Protection said in a news release that the boy died shortly after midnight on Tuesday.
The boy showed “signs of potential illness” on Monday and was taken with his father to a hospital in Alamogordo, New Mexico, the agency said. There, he was diagnosed with a cold and a fever, was given prescriptions for amoxicillin and Ibuprofen and released on Monday afternoon after being held 90 minutes for observation, the agency said.
The boy was returned to the hospital on Monday evening with nausea and vomiting and died there just hours later, CBP said.
The agency said the cause of the boy’s death has not been determined and that it has notified the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general and the Guatemalan government.
CBP promised “an independent and thorough review of the circumstances”.
The border agency has not yet said when the father and son entered the United States or how long they were detained, saying only in its statement that the boy had been “previously apprehended”….