MAORI CHILD’S DEATH.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19958, 27 November 1926, Page 10

MAORI CHILD’S DEATH.

PARENTS’ SHAMEFUL NEGLECT. MEDICAL ATTENTION DENIED. (Special to Daily Times.) AUCKLAND, November 26. An inquiry into the death of a Native child named Wao Nuitana was concluded at Raetihi by the district coroner, Mr W. H. Sandford. Ka Kamu Henare, the father of the child, said it was healthy until a few weeks ago. After it had been ill a month it was taken to Dr Boyd. The doctor sent the child to the Raetihi Hospital, as it was suffering from appendicitis. The doctor at the hospital examined the child and said an operation would have to be performed- He (the father) did not leave the child at the hospital, but took him home to Orautoha. About nine days afterwards he removed the child to a neighbour’s house and it died there three days later. The child had no medicine from the time it became ill until it died, and the only time it saw a doctor was at Raetihi. He did not leave the child at the hospital as it was under Ratana’s treatment. Ratana saw the child about a month ago but did not treat it. Dr Boyd said he had made a post mortem examination and found that death due due to appendicitis which had developed into peritonitis. Had an operation been performed when he first saw the child its life would probably have been saved. It was evident from the whole history of the case that the boy had been sadly neglected, A nurse at the hospital said that when the father and mother brought the child to the hospital they would not get out of the car. The mother would not let the child leave her. The doctor examined the child, and he told the parents that if the child were taken home it would probably die, but that if it were operated on it would have a chance of recovering. The father was willing, but the mother objected. They tried hard to persuade the mother to have the child attended to, but without avail The coroner returned a verdict that the cause of ,death was appendicitis, but added that the child had been shamefully neglected by its parents during its illness, in that medical attention had been denied.