PHILADELPHIA — Raspy cries and barky coughs echoed across the emergency room at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children on a recent chilly morning in North Philadelphia. Kids had just started to stream into the waiting room, yet every available bed was already filled.
Fifteen-month-old Zariya Sutton-Pack wheezed as she waited for medical attention on a hospital gurney. Her chest and rib cage heaved under a white cotton onesie. It looked as though she were trying to draw air through a collapsed paper straw.
"I just burst into tears this morning. I was so scared," said her mom, Tyshanek Sutton, still wearing the puffy black winter jacket that she hadn't had time to take off.
