The Gauteng Department of Health has confirmed that they been made aware of an incident that happened at Sebokeng Hospital in the Vaal, where a family was given the wrong baby to bury.

DOUBLE TRAGEDY

The parents of the baby want to know what happened to their daughter because they want to give her a proper burial. The mother Ntsebeng Motaung said after giving birth on the 28th of April, she was shown a baby girl. "When I was done giving birth, the nurse who was helping me came and held the baby up for me to see. She asked if I could tell the gender and I confirmed that it was a girl, then she walked away. In a short space of time I was told that my baby didn't make it and that she had passed on," said the devastated mother. She said the nurse told her to call a family member to organise a private undertaker to remove the child from hospital. Thereafter, the hospital organised counselling for her. "I sent my sister a call back and she called me. I explained the situation and she came with an undertaker that Friday. The funeral was organised for the following Wednesday and everything was prepared. The day before the funeral I went to the undertaker with family members who helped me identify the baby. However, only the chest was shown to us. The ID number and name on the baby matched mine, so we were convinced everything was in order," she said.

THE WRONG BABY

She added that as per instruction from the undertaker they went back on the day of the funeral to bath and dress the baby before burial.

"When we got there we noticed that the gender of the baby was wrong, it was a boy instead of a girl. We almost buried someone else's child. We had to

call home and cancel the funeral." Motaung added that her sister assisted her all the way to the point of going back to the hospital to get answers.

"The matron said she couldn't help us because they don't know where or what happened to my baby. We've opened a case with the police and

sought answers with the health department who said they are investigating the matter." The father of the baby said he struggles to sleep at night and is

haunted by his missing infant. He said they've come to terms with the loss but they just want to give their infant a decent burial.

FINDING CLOSURE

Spokesperson Motalatale Modiba said, "The Quality Assurance team is currently working on this case to ensure that there is closure. There

has already been a redress meeting with the family on Friday, 05 May 2023, where the family was offered psychosocial services that they can access

whenever they are ready to attend the session. Quality Assurance is currently engaging the family to finalise the issue of conducting DNA tests which will

help to settle this matter. The process cannot proceed until we get consent from the patient," he said.