Report Claims Bulgarian Premature Baby Born Dead

The forensic report states that the baby from the town of Gorna Oryahovitsa was born dead, which contradicts the information from the special surveillance devices. Photo by Sofia Photo Agency

The prematurely-born baby by a 17-year-old girl in the Bulgarian town of Gorna Oryahovitsa has been born dead, states the forensic report by experts from Sofia, the Bulgarian National Radio informed.

Todor Chernev, who is one of the doctors who performed the autopsy, has announced that the premature birth began the previous day, November 27, and the mother waited 20 hours before calling the hospital to say she had contractions.

“[The reason for the abortion] was most probably an infection, which caused the premature birth. The fetus could have died during the birth or before that. It would have either been born dead or would have been born alive and die immediately after that. It does not matter. It was severely damaged anyway,” Chernev said.

According to him, the fibrilations that the baby had were not signs of life. Chernev explained that they were muscular reflexes, which occur as a result of the decreasing temperature when there is a brain dead.

Bulgaria's Interior Minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov, said on Tuesday that “everything that is provided as an expertise should be looked throughly in order to be found out where does the inconsistency come from.”

“In the first hours, they say the baby is alive and it has to be weighted, and it has to be under 500 grams. Before the autopsy, the baby was 700 grams. There are a lot of questions on why did the doctors talk in the way they did,” he said.

The conclusion of the report has been sent by fax to he Regional Prosecutor's Office in the city of Veliko Tarnovo. The spokesperson, Rumyana Irmanova, has stated that they are expecting soon the original report.

In her words, the conclusion of the expert will be compared to the other materials from the investigation, in order to be decided whether there are grounds for raising charges against the doctors.

"The conclusion of the report is in contradiction with the tapes from the special surveillance devices from doctors' phone calls and with statements by witnesses, which show malpractice," Irmanova said.

In her words, there was a possibility for assigning additional tasks to the experts who prepared the forensic report.

Earlier on Tuesday, Bulgaria's right-wing Blue Coalition demanded from Tsvetanov, to announce the forensic report, like he did on December 3 when he read the transcript of the tapes from special surveillance devices.

The Blue Coalition also stated it will demand Tsvetanov's resignation if the report proves that the doctors from Gorna Oryahovitsa had done everything they could to save the baby's life.

The four doctors were arrested November 30 on suspicions that they left a prematurely born baby to die without helping it, and the scandal grew enormously as the police released tapes of conversations between the hospital head and some of the doctors, in which they use very cynical language with respect to the baby's fate and make it clear they are aware they could face charges over its death.

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