A dad who suddenly lost his 4-year-old daughter to the flu and pneumonia is left shocked and heartbroken by the girl’s untimely death.
Martell Grinage told Fox 11 little Ashanti caught a cold after church on Sunday evening. On Tuesday, her parents took her to the hospital after she had come down with a 103-degree fever.
The young girl from North Texas was sent home once her fever subsided. The symptoms doctors noticed in Ashanti that day were her sore throat and cough and she was given over the counter medications for the duration of her cold, by Wednesday her fever was gone.
Martell told CBS 11 on Thursday:
“She wasn’t even running [a] fever at this time, we just knew she was very sluggish and she wasn’t eating.”
Her mother took her back to ER and she died later that day from pneumonia.
The family is still trying to process how fast the child’s health declined. The little girl didn’t have any known health issues and only started showing symptoms four days before her death. Martell said:
“In four days I lost my girl, a total of four days.”
Ashanti did not receive the flu vaccine. Her dad said he’ll “forever wonder” if he could have done anything more to prevent his daughter’s death.
He told Fox:
“I feel like I let her down and I lied to her because I told her I’d never let nothing bad happen to her. That’s what’s killing me.”
As previously reported by Dearly, medical experts encourage parents to give children a seasonal flu shot as the first line of defense against the flu virus.
Dr. Christopher Perkins of Dallas County Health and Human Services (DCHHS) told CBS:
“We cannot predict the intensity, severity or duration of the flu season from year to year. The best way to protect yourself and others is to get your seasonal flu shot.”
According to the station, Ashanti’s death is the seventh flu-related tragedy in Dallas County for the season.
Her family said they lost the light of their life.
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