KATHMANDU, Feb 13: A Nepali infant who captured the hearts of people in Virginia by successfully undergoing cleft-palate surgery two months ago, was found dead in a bathtub this week, the Miami Herald reported Thursday.
Nine-month-old Tendral Meytok Gurung, who was abandoned by her parents in a Nepalese Himalayan village owing to her facial deformity, was brought by a Buddhist nun Lama Tenzin to Virginia last year where she received a free cleft-palate surgery at Operation Smile, a medical charity that has treated thousands of children with facial deformities since 1982.
She died on Tuesday in a tub in Sunny Isles Beach where she was left unattended to for half-an-hour by her caretaker and Tenzin’s sister Samchue Negi.
Police have arrested Negi and charged her with child neglect and aggravated manslaughter of a child. Police say Negi left the infant unattended to while she talked on the phone.
The woman and the baby were staying at the home of a couple who financed their trip to the United States so the baby could receive cleft-palate surgery.
Tendral first made headlines in December when Negi took her to Hampton
Roads, Virginia, for free treatment to fix her cleft lip and cleft palate, according to The Virginian-Pilot newspaper.
´´The little girl recovered quickly and was a smiling, gurgling highlight of the international charity´s world summit meeting in January,´´ a Virginian-Pilot story said Wednesday, the day after Tendral was found dead.
The article said that during her passage through Virginia, Tendral had ``inspired schoolchildren, brought adults to tears and even had several people offer to adopt her.´´
Negi was the primary caretaker responsible for the care of the female infant, the police said in a statement. ``The subject [Negi] prepared a bath for the victim, and then left the victim unattended for approximately 30 minutes while she participated in a telephone conversation in a separate room.
``The victim was then discovered unresponsive by the subject. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue responded and transported the victim to the hospital, where she was pronounced deceased. The subject was arrested and charged.´´
A statement from Operation Smile said the charity was ``shocked and saddened to hear of the devastating, tragic death of 9-month-old Tendral Meytok Gurung in Florida. . . . We are distraught that her chance has been cut so short.´´
The statement said Tendral came to the United States for treatment on Dec. 18 and that Operation Smile co-founder and chief executive officer Dr. Bill Magee performed the surgery.
´´Tendral was released from the hospital two days later for recuperation in Virginia,´´ the statement said. ``Nearly one month later, she was fully recovered and there was no planned follow-up.´´
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