In Britain, a neonatal nurse has been accused of murdering seven babies while attempting to kill ten more and deliberately poisoning two other infants with insulin.
Between 2015 and 2016, Lucy Letby, 32, allegedly murdered five baby boys and two baby girls and also attempted to kill ten other infant boys and girls while being employed at the Countess of Chester Hospital in northwest England.
Earlier, Letby pleaded not guilty to the charges.
According to the BBC, the court heard testimony from a woman who allegedly interrupted Letby as she was killing her child.
The mother of the infant, who was given the initial “E,” was told that the blood coming from the infant’s mouth was coming from a tube, which she was not aware of, according to evidence presented at Manchester Crown Court.
Letby is being accused of killing infant “E” and attempting to kill his twin, infant “F” the next day, BBC reported.
Prosecutor Nick Johnson claimed during the opening statement of the defendant’s trial that, starting in 2015, a dramatic increase in the amount of infant deaths and “serious catastrophic collapses” was observed at the hospital.
He told the jury, “Babies who had not been unstable at all suddenly deteriorated. Sometimes babies who had been sick, but then been on the mend suddenly deteriorated for no apparent reason.”
Police eventually launched an investigation after doctors couldn’t figure out the cause of death.
What they found was that someone in the neonatal unit had poisoned two infant boys with insulin just two days after they were born.
According to Johnson, the two infant boys’ blood sugar levels had fallen to risky levels, but both were saved by medical personnel.
Johnson claimed that Letby was on duty in the neonatal until the two infants’ time of death.
Prosecutors suspected Letby, who they described as a “constant malevolent presence” at the hospital’s neonatal unit when the infants collapsed or died, was responsible for the deaths of all 17 babies.
Letby’s first victim is said to have been a premature baby who she killed at only one day old in 2015.
A medical expert found that air provided purposefully “by someone who knew it would cause significant harm” was the most likely cause of the baby’s collapse, supporting the prosecutor’s claim that Letby injected air into the child’s bloodstream.
In May 2017, police opened an investigation into several infant fatalities at the hospital.
Before being charged in November 2020, Letby was detained three times concerning the deaths.
According to the BBC, the jury has been informed that the trial could run up to six months.
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