Another child has died needlessly because of the criminal ignorance of a deficient school transportation system. Three-year-old Nuran Adiya Ma was left locked in the school van when pre-kindergarten activities began last Wednesday at her Bamrung Muslim School in Pattani. The terrible result was revealed when her mother arrived to pick her up in mid-afternoon. The van driver is under arrest, the school head and teachers are shocked, the family is grieving.
The worst part of Nuran Adiya's death is how careless it was. The child is just the latest in a too-long list of the same unacceptable behaviour by schools and contractors. Just two months ago, another young child died in exactly the same circumstances. Children picked up home fall asleep as the school van makes its rounds from home to home to gather children. The van arrives at the school, the child fails to awaken, the driver and supervisor both overlook the sleeping child, and death occurs.
These are completely avoidable deaths. While the van drivers are arrested for their carelessness, no time in prison ever can make up for the loss of a child whose potential never will be known or met. And it is only infuriating when the apologists point out that babies die when locked in cars in the West. There are an average 37 babies who die inside locked cars in America, for example, but they all are the result of careless and criminal parents or relatives. A currently viral news video shows a policeman rescuing an almost-dead child from a car where she was locked by a mother who went off to buy liquor and "forgot" her locked-in daughter for 12 hours.
