3-year-old girl dies after scorpion crawls into her bed: ‘Infinite pain’

A 3-year-old Brazilian girl died last week after a scorpion crawled under her clothes and stung her while she slept, Newsflash reports, citing local media.

Maria Fernanda Brito da Silva suffered a cardiac arrest while fighting for her life at the Hospital Regional de Mato Grosso do Sul in Campo Grande.

Medics had treated Maria with antivenom antibody therapy, but she died in an intensive care unit on Oct. 1.

She was stung Sept. 25 at her home in Ribas do Rio Pardo, Brazil.

“It is with immeasurable sadness and regret that the City of Ribas do Rio Pardo, through the Municipal Health Department (Sesau), announces that the child Maria Fernanda Brito da Silva died this Sunday morning,” Ribas do Rio Pardo city officials said in a statement last week.

Maria’s mother, Vanessa Ramirez da Silva, painfully described the scorpion attack that killed her beloved daughter.

“The image will stay in my head forever. She sat on the bed, turned around, and I saw the scorpion stuck to her back. It wasn’t a small scorpion, it was a big scorpion,” said Ramirez da Silva, 27, per a translation of a Primeira Pagina report.

“I hit her and she, even though she was in pain, raised her little finger and showed that the scorpion ended up on my shirt. I hit my hand, threw it on the ground, and killed it.”

Ramirez da Silva said she went outside and screamed for help as Maria started vomiting. A neighbor brought the family to the hospital.

Primeira Pagina reports Ramirez da Silva’s brother and her 5-year-old son were previously stung by scorpions.

Maria’s wake and burial were held Oct. 2.

Her grandmother, Cleide Cristina Ramirez, said the pain is indescribable.

“It’s infinite pain,” she said. “My daughter is a fighter, a single mother, she gives her life for her children.”

More than 3,000 scorpion-related cases have been reported this year in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, according to health department data.

In August, a 5-year-old boy from Ribas do Rio Pardo died after being stung by a scorpion that was inside his shoe.

38 people have been stung by scorpions in the city since the beginning of the year.

33 attacks were recorded last year.

Experts say Brazil’s scorpions have adapted to survive in sewers, garbage and rubble in urban areas.

The country’s yellow scorpion, the deadly Tityus serrulatus, is said to be the most dangerous scorpion in South America.