Raising awareness of the tragic potential of a head knock
IN THE MEDIA: June 12, 2025.
The Office of Early Childhood Education’s chief advisor Dr Sarah Alexander has been looking into the death of Lorenzo Miranda, a 20-month-old boy, for several years.
This week, the Coroner’s finding into Lorenzo’s death was made public.
Coroner Amelia Steel found that Lorenzo died in 2017 from a brain bleed after falling and hitting his head at the ECE centre he attended, Little Monkeys Preschool in Palmerston North.
The story was covered by Stuff and then picked up by the New Zealand Herald.
Alexander was contacted for comment and was quoted in the Stuff story.
She said: “This tragedy was avoidable… In my view, there were [some] clear and serious failures in Lorenzo’s care before and after his accident.”
WorkSafe, the Coroner and the Ministry of Education were all of the view that Little Monkeys Preschool had not failed to meet any health and safety requirements in how it handled Lorenzo’s suspected accident. But Alexander disagreed.
“No ECE service should be able to avoid being held responsible for an accident or injury to a child in their care by simply saying they don’t know what happened,” she said.
Read details and opinion on the care of the child before and after the accident.
The OECE has also written a specialised report for ECE teachers and educators, highlighting what the sector can learn from Lorenzo’s death.
Read our full report on learnings for ECE Services here.
