A Guatemalan migrant boy died shortly on Tuesday after being detained by American border agents, the US authorities said, making him the second migrant child to die this month after being detained at the frontier between Mexico and the United States.
The boy, 8, and his father were in US Customs and Border Protection custody on Monday when an officer noticed the child showing signs of illness, the agency said. The father and son were taken to the Gerald Champion Regional Medical Centre in Alamogordo, New Mexico, where the boy was diagnosed with a common cold and fever, and eventually discharged by hospital staff.
But later that evening, the child began vomiting and was transferred back to the hospital. He died there shortly after midnight. The official cause of death is not known.
The father and son were not identified, and the agency said it would release more details "as available and appropriate".
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It is the second death this month of a migrant child who was held after trying to cross the US-Mexico border. Earlier in December, Jakelin Caal, 7, also from Guatemala, died after being detained along with her father by US border agents.
