New Year’s Eve brought tragedy to a Japanese family vacationing in Borneo for the holidays. As 5 year old Reo Ohta, the youngest son in the family of four, was playing in shallow waters at a beach in Kota Belud, he was stung by jellyfish and died only moments later.
The boy’s father, 48 year old Momo Ohta, says there was a low tide on the morning of December 31st, and Reo, along with his 8 year old brother, Remu, were only in waters about a one meter (3.3 feet) deep in front of their cabin. Momo’s wife, 36 year old Inna Batwa, says she saw the incident, and while it appeared the boys were playing at first, Reo’s scream made it clear that something was wrong. When they pulled him out of the water, they could see the marks from the jellyfish sting on his legs, but the boy passed out and stopped breathing as they set him down on the beach.
It ended up taking more than an hour to get Reo to the hospital, and while his parents tried giving him CPR, medical staff pronounced him dead shortly after his arrival. Momo sadly admits that he’s certain his son died on the beach, only minutes after the sting. After doing some research, Momo found that vinegar is the best solution to treat the poison from jellyfish stings, but when the villa staff came to help, they only rubbed sand on the wound, which made things worse. He feels they should have been given proper training on how to handle such an emergency.
January 3rd was to be Reo’s fifth birthday, but instead it was the day his body was cremated. Momo adds that he still can’t comprehend how his son died within minutes of playing in calm, shallow waters, and questions why there wasn’t any warnings about the danger present in jellyfish season. While the family’s vacation was supposed to last through January 12th, they are now making arrangements to return to Japan.
[via Borneo Post]
