A BABY choked to death on a piece of apple while her mother, who cannot speak English, desperately tried to tell neighbours what was wrong.

The baby’s mother, a Chinese asylum seeker, ran into the street for help after her ten-month-old daughter stopped breathing.

Neighbours living in Humber Place, in the Skerne Park area of Darlington, made frantic attempts to save the baby’s life.

Nichola Easthope, 37, described yesterday how she gave the girl mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

She said: “The mother was screaming and crying and the baby had gone blue. I was asking her what was wrong, but she couldn’t say.

“I tried to stick my fingers down the baby’s throat to see if anything was stuck, but I didn’t want to go too far.”

She added: “I can’t get my head round what happened. I can’t sleep – I just keep seeing the baby’s eyes.”

Terrence Gilligan, from Tees Drive, Darlington, was visiting his daughter, who lives in the street, when the incident happened last Friday evening.

He said: “I heard some terrible shouting and screaming – I just thought it was kids fighting, to be honest.

“My daughter went out – unfortunately, the woman couldn’t speak any English so nobody knew what had happened.

“The ambulance came and she gestured that she wanted my partner to go with her, but the paramedics said she couldn’t.”

Instead, he and his partner, Jacqueline Watson, followed the ambulance by car to Darlington Memorial Hospital.

Mr Gilligan said: “The police and nurses were trying to get a translator. My partner even went to a couple of local takeaways to try, but they were too busy to help.

“That poor girl had to suffer the loss of her baby with no one who could talk to her or understand her.”

It is understood the woman, who is in her 20s, was placed in the house by immigration services several months ago.

It is believed she is a Mandarin speaker who lives alone and has no friends or family living locally. She was not at the house yesterday.

A neighbour said: “She is very quiet. We don’t really talk because she doesn’t speak English, but I would see her in the garden with the baby.”

Durham Police are investigating the death on behalf of the coroner. A post-mortem examination confirmed the baby choked on a piece of apple.

Acting Detective Superintendent Adrian Green last night paid tribute to neighbours who rushed to the woman’s aid and said the language barrier probably played no part in the baby’s death.

He said: “The pathologist said it was unlikely the mother or neighbours would have been able to save the baby, whatever they did.

“It’s an awful tragedy – the mother speaks no English and is alone in a foreign country.”

A spokeswoman for Darlington Memorial Hospital said a paediatric resuscitation team was waiting for the ambulance bringing in the mother and child.

She said: “They were seen immediately. At that stage, the language wasn’t a barrier as the treatment would have been the same.”