Baby stolen 2 hours after birth at Kaberamaido Hospital

Police in Kaberamaido are investigating circumstances under which a baby girl was stolen from a public hospital ward in the district.

Caretaker Ruth Ailo told Monitor that her relative Regin Ayoko was booked into the Kaberamaido District General Hospital labour ward on Thursday at 6:00am

“After giving birth at around 7:30am under the help of the midwives, the baby was stolen shortly after while I was cleaning the baby mother’s blood-stained clothes,” she said.  

On her part, 24-year-old Ayoko revealed that the suspect first approached her on her bed, asking that the babies were needed for immunization to which she replied that the morning slot for immunization had been allocated to big babies.

“The suspect whom I don’t know walked away. I also ignored since I didn’t suspect any ill intentions but after a few minutes, I walked away to drop the cups of tea. On returning, I found the baby missing,” Ayoko, a resident of Onyati Village, Kamuk Parish in the same district narrated on Friday.  

Loyce Anyodo, an assistant nursing officer at Kaberamaido Hospital said the incident left the mother of the newborn baby in anguish.

“The burden of carrying a womb for 9 months only for the baby to be stolen just 2 hours after giving birth,” she added but said she had never witnessed such a scenario in her 23 years of service.

Hospital medical superintendent Dr Erick Auna said authorities have been informed about the child theft.  

“We are burdened. The policy should be one patient, one attendant but the people from the communities come in with more than 4 attendants so it makes it hard to track suspicious persons,” he observed.

By press time, a police file had been opened and members of the mother’s family had tendered in their statements to help police truck down the suspect.