Family of Massachusetts 5-year-old boy found unresponsive at beach gets devastating news

The family of a young child that was found unresponsive after a trip to a Cape Cod beach has received some devastating news.

According to Sandwich Police, police received a 911 call reporting a missing 5-year-old at Snake Pond Beach in Forestdale.

Within moments, the report was updated after the 5-year-old was found under the water and not breathing.

Sandwich Police and Fire responded to the scene, where bystanders were performing CPR. Officers and Paramedics rendered aid to the 5-year-old boy who was at the beach with a parent.

Zohaib Malik-Mohammad was transported by ambulance to Falmouth Hospital for treatment.

The boy’s father’s stated Wednesday that the family has received some grim news.

“Per neurology, based on the MRI and neurological evaluations, it is suspected that Zohaib will have long term deficits that impact his cognition (his ability to interpret and label items, environment, people, etc.) and possibly other areas of development. Zohaib’s hearing and vision are intact meaning that he can hear your voices and other sounds, and he can see (maybe not as well as he did before), but he will likely not be able to identify items because of where the injury is in the brain and how it impacts his cognitive abilities.”

“Intensive therapies such as physical, occupational and speech therapy will work with Zohaib (in a rehab setting once he is medically safe to transfer out of the ICU) to help him try to regain some of the skills that he had before. It is unknown how much Zohaib will be able to recover, however, the therapies will help him get to his maximum potential.”

“Zohaib will have to relearn all of the skills that he is currently without (sitting, walking, feeding, etc.). Per the medical team, it is very likely that there are skills that Zohaib will never recover.”

A GoFundMe page has been created to help the family with expenses and has raised $58,000 as of this writing.