10 American Tourists Lost Their Lives in Mysterious Ways While on Vacation in the Dominican Republic

The authorities of both countries work hard to establish the causes of each death and determine whether or not they are related to each other or are unfortunate coincidences.

The first death this year has been found and has also been announced this week; Jerry Curran, a 78-year-old retired police officer who died in January at the Dreams Resort in Punta Cana. After three days of setting foot in the country, Curran began to vomit and lost consciousness.

He died a few hours later in the hospital, the cause of death was reported as pulmonary edema, according to the autopsy. In declarations to American media the daughter of the deceased, Kellie Brown, said that her father had left healthy to enjoy his vacations and nobody explained how he died.

The first American victim was Yvette Monique Sport, 51, from Glenside, Pa. She died in June 2018 in a hotel in Bahia Principe, Punta Cana, after consuming drinks from the minibar. A month later, the tourist David Harrison died at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in the same city of what was reported as a heart attack and pulmonary edema.

Last April John Corcoran died after suffering a heart attack, and Robert Bell Wallace, 67, of California, who spent four days in a hospital after becoming ill in the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, died too. In May, Miranda Schaup-Werner, 41, of Pennsylvania, died hours after consuming a drink from the minibar of the Bahia Principe Hotel in La Romana.

After his death was joined by the deaths of Cynthia Day, 49, and Nathaniel Holmes, 63, of Maryland, a couple who were celebrating their wedding anniversary and wer later found dead in the hotel room where they were staying.

Although the Dominican authorities have declared that the causes of each death is fully clarified and that they have been classified as 'mysterious' erroneously, we must wait until the next report from the Ministry of Tourism to verify if these cases have influenced the visits of Americans to the island.

The FBI has said that they carry out deeper toxicological tests on the bodies to determine if there were other factors that intervened in the fatal outcomes, however the results of these tests will not be available for another 30 days.

Meanwhile it is advisable to use common sense, as it should be used at home, get a medical check before leaving on a trip and not exceed with food and alcoholic beverages, it is health and ultimately life, which is in risk.