When 12-year-old Alyssa Alcaraz first started throwing up her family thought she just had a case of food poisoning. When her symptoms did not subside, they took her to the doctor who diagnosed her with the flu. California has been dealing with a major flu epidemic this season, and nobody questioned the diagnosis at the time.
But, after staying home from school for a few days, the young girl was still sick and her symptoms were not improving. That's when her parents took her to Urgent Care, according to ABC13. At Urgent Care, the doctors realized something was wrong because her oxygen levels were critically low and rushed her to the hospital. Despite the hospital's best efforts, they could not save the young girl.
The girl suffered "cardiac arrest and septic shock from a strep blood infection", which nobody realized she had. While the infection can be fatal in about 5% adults, it can be treated with penicillin.
The family has set up a GoFundMe page to help pay for funeral costs.