Jahi McMath, 13, was released from Children’s Hospital & Research Center in Oakland, Cali. on Jan. 5 into her parents’ care after her family’s month-long fight to have her taken to a facility where she would be treated like she has hope for recovery — and not as a lifeless body. Though Jahi was declared brain dead by doctors and the court after complications from a tonsil surgery, her parents have faith there’s a chance she will wake up again. Transportation to a new hospital is the family’s first major victory.
Jahi’s family has gotten one step closer in their fight to have their daughter transported to a new hospital with a different treatment plan for the brain dead teen, as Jahi has been released from the hospital and put in her mother’s care.
“The body of Jahi McMath was released by Children’s Hospital & Research Center Oakland to the coroner,” David Durand, the hospital’s chief of pediatrics said in a statement, reported CNN. “The coroner has released her body to the custody of her mother, Latasha Winkfield, as per court order, for a destination unknown.”
Jahi’s exact hospital destination has not been revealed for the sake of her family’s privacy, but caretakers at New York’s New Beginnings Community Center explain they are ready to care for the girl.
“At this time we’re named as the potential facility that Jahi and her family will be coming to,” Allyson Scerri, founder of the New Beginnings, said to CNN.
“We are aware of Jahi McMath’s dire situation, and we are willing to open our outpatient facility to provide 24-hour care as an inpatient, long-term facility for Jahi with the required and appropriate medical staff that she depends upon,” Scerri said, in a court-documented letter. New Beginnings matches her family’s hope, and feels that Jahi’s brain injury may be able to heal. “Her brain needs time to heal. It’s a new injury,” she told CNN. “We believe in life after injury. All of us here at New Beginnings have first-hand experience because we have a loved one that was in the same situation as Jahi.”
Our thoughts are with Jahi’s family at this difficult time.
— Kristine Hope Kowalski
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