Middletown girl, 9, who died from COVID-19 featured in ‘People’ magazine

Dorielis Reyes, 9, a fourth-grader at Wildwood Elementary School in Middletown, appeared to be perfectly healthy until earlier this year. She died on Aug. 19 from the coronavirus. She is featured in this week's People magazine. SUBMITTED PHOTO

Dorielis Reyes, 9, a fourth-grader at Wildwood Elementary School in Middletown, appeared to be perfectly healthy until earlier this year. She died on Aug. 19 from the coronavirus. She is featured in this week's People magazine. SUBMITTED PHOTO

MIDDLETOWN — A national magazine is featuring a Middletown girl who died from the coronavirus in this week’s edition that highlights one story from every state.

Dorielis Reyes, 9, a fourth-grader at Wildwood Elementary School, died Aug. 19 at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. Her ailments were called a medical mystery by the doctors at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and other physicians around the world were consulted.

She spent parts of four months in the hospital and tested positive for COVID-19 in June.

In this week’s People magazine, Editor in Chief Dan Wakeford wrote: “As the year ends, we wanted to pause and remember the loved ones who have died. There is no magazine that has enough pages to pay tribute to all the people whose lives were cut short; so instead we have told the story of one person from each state in America.”

The Journal-News followed the family’s medical journey and the response from the Middletown community.

As a way to offset medical bills, her mother, Doranny Paula, established a GoFundMe account that collected $19,000, which was $4,000 more than its goal.

“While the family grieves, we take comfort that our community rallied around them, lifted them up, and gave help with the medical bills,” the district said on its Facebook page. “We hope the family finds peace. Thank you.”

A week before her daughter’s death, Paula said doctors told her Dorielis was in the “process of dying.”

“It’s so hard,” Paula said while standing outside her daughter’s hospital room. “You never expect your kid, so young, to get this sick.”

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