A man who went for a ride, did not imagine that he would end the day in the hospital and spend about three weeks there, until he finally did not leave there alive. The victim’s sister: “Someone could have saved my brother.”
Valdonilton de Andrade Reyes, 43, was leading a group of cyclists near Punta Negra Beach, Manaus, Brazil, when a bee flew towards him and entered his mouth. Local media reported that this led to a severe allergic reaction which unfortunately led to brain death in the end. The victim was in the middle of riding training on March 2 when the incident occurred, and paramedics who arrived on the scene pronounced him dead at the hospital 21 days later.
“There was a very short window of time in which Valdonilton could have been saved,” explained his sister, Rosilyn Rice. “If he had received oxygen and medical treatment within three minutes of the bite, he would be alive now.” But the medical teams reported that the group’s cycling journey was too far for emergency services to reach the scene in less than three minutes. The nurse also claimed that the 43-year-old struggled to breathe for 20 minutes until the moment the teams arrived.
According to her, since there was no hospital in the area, the one who arrived at the scene of the incident was a firefighting team from a station that was nearby, when a doctor was appointed on duty. “They managed to revive him and keep him alive until the paramedics arrived and took him to an emergency clinic five kilometers away,” she said. He was then transferred to a hospital and placed in intensive care, but unfortunately, on March 23, the medical teams pronounced him dead.
“The doctors told us that the brain can survive up to three minutes without oxygen,” Rosalin said. “If only he had received adequate treatment, from a doctor, a fireman, or a clinic – someone could have saved my brother. But too much time passed and he couldn’t stand it,” she concluded. The family called for precautionary measures to be taken to avoid accidents like this from happening again.