A 12-year-old girl came back to life just as her family was preparing her body for her funeral.
Siti Masfufah Wardah was admitted to a hospital in Probolinggo in the Indonesian province of East Java for chronic diabetes and organ complications on August 18. She was pronounced dead at 6:pm that evening.
Her body was taken to her family home an hour later to allow her relatives clean her, according to traditional Islamic funeral traditions.
But just as they were beginning to clean the body, Siti’s eyes opened and she woke up.
Her father, identified as Ngasiyo, 40, has described the shocking moment when his daughter came back from the dead.
“When her body was being bathed, her body temperature suddenly warmed,” he told local news outlet Detik.
“And her closed eyes suddenly reopened. And we found her heart was beating again and her body moved.”
Doctors were called to the scene and began giving Siti respiratory assistance and oxygen to help her breathe.
Sadly her resurrection didn’t last long and she died — again — an hour later. Her body was washed and she was buried in the Lambangkuning Village Cemetery.
Lumbang Police Chief AKP Muhammad Dugel confirmed the incident after visiting the family home.
“It’s true that there was an incident where the girl died and came back to life, after previously being treated at the Dr Mochamad Saleh Regional Hospital,” he told media.
“When she was washed her body came back to life. For about one hour [she] was alive and then died again.”
It’s believed Siti’s short second life was the result of what’s known as return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC), also called “Lazarus syndrome”.
This phenomenon sometimes occurs in people who have died of heart failure, and usually happens about 10 minutes after someone is confirmed dead following CPR.