YANGON — The family of a baby who died at Yankin Children’s Hospital in Yangon are suing hospital staff after the body was reportedly given to another family.
Four-month-old boy Zau Sut Aung from Shan State’s Muse Township was admitted to the hospital on July 16 to receive treatment for a low white and red blood cell count that had been diagnosed two months before.
The boy was transferred to Halpin Children’s Hospital on July 21, according to his aunty Ja Bauk Mai, but then returned to Yankin on the morning of July 25 because, she said, the hospital had more equipment for the patient. He died at 10 p.m. that night.
When the family went to collect the corpse from the hospital mortuary on July 27, they were told it was given to someone else, said Ja Bauk Mai.
“We were told the body was taken to Kyisu cemetery and crematory [in South Dagon Township] but we did not know what and where Kyisu was as we are not from Yangon,” she told The Irrawaddy on Monday.
The family had intended to give the baby a Christian burial, but persevered with the service without the body.
The family filed the case at Yankin police station on Saturday “as we want the responsible people to be investigated, and we don’t want such a loss to happen again to any other patients and their families,” said the aunty.
On Monday, the family gave their statement to police, who have opened up a case under section 297 of the Penal Code, which carries a jail sentence of up to one year and a fine for someone who “offers any indignity to any human corpse” among other offences.
