A woman in London suffered a miscarriage and had to keep her stillborn baby in home fridge after being turned away by the hospital. Laura Brody said she had to deliver at home after she and her partner Lawrence White sent home by University hospital in Lewisham due to lack of beds.
The hospital has now launched an investigation into the incident. The woman and her husband have claimed that the hospital staff cited inability to store the stillborn.
"I took a tupperware box containing my baby's remains home from hospital in a taxi, cleared up some space in our fridge and put the box in there," Mr White told the BBC.
The couple dialled 999 but were told it was not an emergency, according to the BBC report.
Speaking to The Guardian, Ms Brody said she had already experienced a miscarriage before this, and was told by hospital staff there was no chance of her delivering her baby at home without medical supervision.
But Ms Brody, four months into her pregnancy, delivered the baby in the toilet at home.
When they reached the hospital, the couple were told to wait in the hot and stuffy general waiting room with about 20 or 30 other people.
“No one would want their baby's remains to end up in a tupperware box. It was just shoved on to the side, and completely ignored by staff, and treated like it was trash,” Ms Brody told The Guardian.
“They said we didn't have the paperwork for the remains to be taken to the mortuary. Which we found extraordinary, because it was ridiculous to expect someone who had just given birth at home to suddenly conjure up paperwork,” she added.
The 39-year-old said she decided to speak about her experience after watching a documentary on global miscarriages. “I wanted people to know these experiences are happening in London, in 2022 - not just people in very distant parts of the world,” said Ms Brody.
