A 20-year-old Auckland chef has died of pneumonia less than a month after starting a new job at a Remuera bakery.
Gurvinder Singh, who adopted the name "Garry Gill" after arriving in New Zealand, had complained of a cold but his death in Auckland Hospital yesterday has shocked his family.
His flatmate Sandeep Singh, who flatted with him since both came from India in August 2015, said doctors gave him antibiotics but his body did not respond.
The Indian High Commission will pay for the body to be flown back to India.
Sandeep Singh said he and Gurvinder came to New Zealand to study cookery at the Institute of Applied Learning in Henderson, graduating with diplomas in March this year.
"On the fourth day he started coughing with a fever and he was not able to speak," whereafter he went to a doctor to get medicine.
On the fifth day he coughed blood and they decided to take him to hospital.
Singh said that when Gurvinder got the flu his parents asked him to go home to recover. He had booked a flight to go back to India last Sunday. But when his condition deteriorated in hospital on Saturday, Sandeep Singh rang Gurvinder's parents and his father decided to fly here instead, arriving the next day.
"By Sunday he was getting worse. Every day he was getting worse," Sandeep Singh said, adding he, Gurvinder's father and his cousin had all been at the hospital with him.
"The doctors were trying their best but they were still not able to control the infection."
Gurvinder Singh. Photo / Supplied
Singh said the young chef had not been a smoker and did not drink alcohol.
"In the past two years he never even had a fever," he said.
Gurvinder was an only child.
Singh said he had planned to stay in New Zealand.
"He was not planning to go back to India. He was planning to settle here."
