UK maternity scandal review finds 200 avoidable baby deaths

By JILL LAWLESS
Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — A review into a scandal-hit British hospital group has concluded that persistent failures in maternity care contributed to the avoidable deaths of more than 200 babies over two decades. The review began in 2018 after two families that had lost their babies in the care of Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust in western England campaigned for an inquiry. Former senior midwife Donna Ockenden led an investigation into almost 1,600 incidents between 2000 and 2019. They included including cases of stillbirth, neonatal death, maternal death and other severe complications in mothers and newborns. Ockenden said Wednesday that hospital management “failed to investigate, failed to learn and failed to improve.”