A 4-year-old girl dies shortly after testing positive for COVID-19 in Galveston County, officials say

GALVESTON COUNTY – As COVID-19 cases continue to grow across the country and in the state of Texas, Galveston County reports its youngest COVID-19-related death.

Kali Cook, 4, died asleep shortly after testing positive for COVID-19, her family confirmed Thursday to KPRC, KSAT’s sister station.

Karra Harwood, Kali’s mother, told KPRC that one day after Kali’s positive test she succumbed to the virus.

“I just wanted everyone to know it happened so fast,” Harwood said. “At 2 in the morning [Kali] he began to have a fever. My mother came down and asked my fiancée if I could help her take any medicine. We gave him some medicine and at 7 in the morning he was no longer there. ”

Karra and other members of her family have also tested positive for COVID-19, shortly after Kali’s positive result. He also confirmed that his family was not vaccinated.

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“I took COVID tests and became positive. I tried to quarantine myself. We have a two-story house. They were upstairs and I was downstairs, ”Harwood told KPRC. “My 5-month-old baby even has it. Since then I have taken him to the hospital because I feel that they are not improving and I am terrified ”.

On Thursday, the Galveston County Health District confirmed that Kali’s death was the first death of a child related to COVID-19.

KPRC reports that forensic doctors also determined that the cause of death was the virus.

However, health officials said they will not count Kali’s death as a death from COVID-19 until the autopsy is completed, which began around 1pm on Friday.

“[They told me] died because of Covid, but they are doing an autopsy to see if there is any underlying medical condition that could have made it go so fast, “Harwood told KPRC.

Because the Delta variant accounts for the majority of COVID-19 cases nationwide and children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible for a vaccine, the Galveston County Health Authority said it is not surprising that more children give positive.

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“We are now seeing that our largest group of people with COVID are under the age of 10. So the fact that there are more and more children under the age of 10 who have COVID should come as no surprise that some of them are sick. Some of them go to the hospital and others die. So, in this way, it’s no surprise, “said Dr. Philip Keizer, a local health authority in Galveston County. “She is OK. It is very worrying. I hope this is an opportunity for people to start putting aside the anger they have about COVID and realize that this is serious. “

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