The 10-year-old girl who died 'because she was too fat'

A severely obese 10-year-old girl died because she was too overweight, an inquest has heard.

Shannon Appleton-Gower, who had learning difficulties, was found not breathing in bed at home by her stepfather last November.

The inquest heard that Shannon died from acute cardio-respiratory failure, sleep apnoea and acute pulmonary hypertension - all caused by her weight.

But her stepfather, Dominic Stringer, said Shannon lived an active lifestyle.

He said: 'She was a bubbly character and although she was overweight, she was a very active girl.

'She was outgoing, she was not shy in any way and I would describe her as a bubbly, bouncy little girl.'

Shannon, who lived with her mother Susan, older brother and stepfather in Diss, Norfolk, was found dead shortly before 1am, on November 24, last year.

The inquest heard she was receiving medical help for her health problems and sleep disorders, related to her weight at the time of her death.

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Niger police nab man in possession of baby’s head

The renewed efforts of the Niger State police command to rid the state of criminal elements may have started yielding results, following the discovery of a severed head of a few months old baby girl in a polythene in possession of a young man suspected to be one of the arrow-heads of a syndicate that specialises in using human parts for ritual purposes in parts of the state.

The discovery of the strange object with the suspect (names withheld) occurred early last week, during a stop and search duty by a team of policemen on the highway at Erena, in Shiroro Local Government area of the state .

The NEWSMEN further learnt that trouble began for the young man, when he was allegedly sighted by a policeman, holding a wet Bagco Super sack and attempting to board a commercial vehicle from the village (Erena) with the bag allegedly containing the fresh human head.

It was further gathered that, as the suspect was about to board the vehicle, the policeman allegedly observed that a liquid substance which was a mixture of blood and water was said to have been oozing from the bag.

A police source at the homicide section of the state Criminal Investigation Department(CID), Minna, the state capital, informed the Nigerian Tribune that, as a result of that, the policeman became suspicious and requested to know the content of the bag.

The source who craved for anonymity in a chat with the NT stated that the suspect allegedly told the Policeman that the bag contained some pieces of fresh Tomatoes , just as the policeman insisted that he must be allowed

to see whether it was “Tomatoes” or not.

“It was however at the point of a very serious struggle between the suspect and the policeman, that some concerned on lookers who were either passing by of attempting to board commercial vehicles near the scene who assisted the policeman in apprehending the suspect. And when they forced the bag opened, they now saw the head of human being concealed in the sack” the source stated

NT was further informed that no sooner that the strange object was discovered with the suspect that an irate mob gathered with the view to beating him into a pulp, but that the policeman was allegedly able to maneuver him to the nearby police outpost in the village where he was kept in the police cell as he was said to have confessed to the crime during investigation by the police.

“He now confessed that another person gave him the head and at the point of the police trying to track down the person he also escaped from the police’s cell that fateful night , while the police went to look for the person whom he said gave him the head . But after apprehending the man, fortunately for the police, the following morning, he was re-arrested and the two of them have been transferred to the state CID for further investigation” said the source.

Meanwhile, the Spokesman of the state Police Command, Mr. Richard Adamu Oguche has confirmed the incident in a brief interview with the NT in his office at the Command’s headquarters, Minna, adding that the two suspected ritulists have allegedly confessed to the crime, just as they had promised to take the police to the hideout of the remaining members of the gang.

“In fact we deliberately decided to keep their names as top secret pending the arrest of the remaining members of the gang, so that it will not jeopardize police’s further investigation of the case if the names of the two suspects in our custodies were allowed to be mentioned in the media” said Oguche, an ASP.

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Girl born without limbs in Bauchi (photo)

A baby, girl, without hands and legs, has been born in Sandigalua village in Zaki Government Area of Bauchi State. The baby, named Fatima, was born to the family of Ahmadu Didda, a peasant farmer and wife, Rukaiyya, on January 13.

Fatima’s father, Didda, however, expressed gratitude to God for giving them the child, describing her as a beautiful baby. Didda said Fatima was delivered at home and that both the mother and the baby are healthy.

Father’s plea

He said: “This is a gift from God. But it won’t be easy for us to raise Fatima because without legs and hands, she needs special care and attention. We feel sorry for her but with assistance from government and individuals I know that she will live a good life.”

The couple, however, appealed to both government and well-meaning individuals to come to their aid in order to care for the child.

Also, in a special appeal, a blind man who is the Chairman of Physically-Challenged People in Sakwa, Mr. Abdullahi Gindi, said: ‘’It is the duty of society to ensure that Fatima is not discriminated against as a result of her condition.

“She (Fatima) needs to be assisted. We are grateful that she was born a healthy child. She sulks normally and so we need to protect her.

’’But her parents are poor and that is why we are calling for assistance so that Fatima would live.”

Doctor’s opinion

A medical practitioner, Dr. Cletus Eze, has said that a woman can have a deformed baby if she takes certain drugs at the early stages of her pregnancy.

Dr. Eze, who spoke in a telephone interview with Vanguard, lamented that Nigeria was one of the few countries in the world where even a university graduate would buy drugs from the shelf and swallow them without even reading the leaflets accompanying such drugs.

According to him, a woman can give birth to a deformed child like Fatima if she takes drugs like flagyl within the first three months of her pregnancy.

Self-medication

He said: ‘’Nigeria is the only country where people buy drugs from non-professionals and administer same on themselves. There must be laws to regulate some of these bad practices because of the harmful effects of certain drugs.

“The mother of Fatima must have taken certain drugs, which she would not even remember having taken at the early stages or within the first three months of her pregnancy.

’’The worst thing is that she might not even be able to sue anybody, because such drugs were not prescribed by qualified people and she must have forgotten the particular drugs she took or where she bought them.

“The authorities must continue to educate the citizens on the bad effects of self medication,” he added.

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Father watches in horror as daughter, 10, is grabbed and swallowed by crocodile

A father helplessly watched on as his 10-year-old daughter was snatched and killed by a crocodile in Indonesia.

The pair and the youngster's brother had been hunting for turtles in the East Nusatenggara province when the girl, Juraida, was dragged in to the water by a giant saltwater crocodile.

Speaking to the Jakarta Post Indonesian official Viktor Mado Waton said 'Juraida was seized when she was in about half a metre of water at the river’s mouth.''Her father and brother could only watch helplessly.'

A rescue team was later deployed to the scene only to discover a dress and a hair ribbon on the sand, near the sight of the incident.Her body has yet to be found.

Local residents had already told officials they had seen several crocodiles sun-bathing at the river mouth a few days before the incident.

And last month a boy was killed by a crocodile in the same river whilst villagers have also reported a loss of livestock.

The salt water crocodile is the largest of all living reptiles and is more commonly found in Australia, the eastern coast of India and parts of Southeast Asia.

Although, on average, there are just two fatal attacks reported per year in recent years there have been attacks close to the latest incident in Borneo, Sumatra and Myanmar

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Angry Nigerian Children Write Jonathan Over Christmas Day Blasts

Written by Association of Conscious Nigerian Children (ACNC)

Dear Mr. President: We should say Merry Christmas but we are not your government, we are not in the business of deception. After almost ten hours of gathering your thoughts to speak on the bomb blasts that rocked the nation yesterday, you still fell short of your own very low standards. 

 What did you intend to say when you said Bomb Blasts are a burden we must live with? Why do you bother to budget over a trillion for security if we must live with the burden of insecurity? How come you are still a president? We do not blame you, we blame our older ones who were stupid enough to think that where you come from and your religion was all you needed to be a competent president. 

They are crying now. We all cried yesterday on the darkest Christmas day of our short lives. While we cried and left Christmas postponed for another year, we watched as you danced your life away like there was no tomorrow. Is it true that all you care about is the fact that you are the president so whatever can happen should happen. 

Last night we prayed for you. We prayed that the white men should be able to make common sense so that we can budget for it and then you will have it in abundance. As it is, it is obvious sir that you are grossly lacking in common sense. 

If you weren’t, you would never come out to tell a mourning nation that it should get ready to live with the burden of destruction and insecurity. That was utterly insensitive and even the dumbest of our mates, fellow Nigerian children would never descend that low to an unprecedented level of cluelessness. We understand this is not a sane country, if this was a sane country, your ilk will not be in a job. Your security chiefs, yourself and your cabinet would have been throwing resignation letters left right and centre. 

But then, here is a place where people are satisfied with just being in positions, that they are clueless about what to do in such positions does not matter. Mr. President, Boko Haram defeated you in 2011. 

What plans are you making for 2012? Do you realise they have since improved while your security tactics remain stop and search? Do you realise they are far more coordinated than ever before? Have you thought of engaging more intelligence in curbing this menace instead of just mere brute? Yes, you have issues with concentrating for long, why not budget for a concentrator? That way you are conditioned to at least focus on being the president of Nigeria instead of our national chief chef? You are wondering where that came from? It came from cassava bread sir. 

You chose the menu for 2012 but we hope you realise that Boko Haram certainly has a menu. Please Mr. President, they will look to attack again in the New Year, do what you have never done before, get your security chiefs to prevent that by all means. Contrary to your assertion, we are not prepared to live with the burden of bomb blasts. 

Get yourself to work and stop excusing your inability to deal with Boko Haram on the premise that they are a necessity. What is that? If you cannot lead and be a president, help yourself and resign. Please take your vice-president along. You are a twin set of incompetence. 

 This letter has been written with kind words, not because we are in the mood to be nice to you but because we are children and respect is a value we want to live with but our lack of it sometimes is a burden you must live with as long as you force us to live with your Boko Haram burden. 

 We wrote you a letter on subsidy yesterday but we figured it would be better to send this before you get our other letter. As long as your cluelessness reigns supreme in this country, we will always remind you of our angst and stake in this nation. It is not by force to live in Aso Rock. So if you must, do the right things, say the right things and learn to get the basic things right. 

The Bomb Blasts darkened our Christmas but your response dampened our mood even further. This is not the way to lead a people. If you need help, we will nominate one of us to offer you words of wisdom for free. As it is, you look overwhelmed by the mere job of providing security for Nigeria let alone the other duties you swore to carry out for Nigeria. Action point: Sack yourself sir, and take Arc. Namadi Sambo along. It is a good place to start. Signed: Association of Conscious Nigerian Children (ACNC)

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