2 months ago
20
Hospital bosses "facilitated a mass murderer" by ignoring concerns about Lucy Letby, the mother of one of the babies killed by the neonatal nurse said.
She said her daughter's death in October 2015 could have been prevented had "prompt and effective action" been taken after three infants died in June of that year at the Countess of Chester Hospital.
Letby murdered the baby girl, who can only be identified as Child I, by injecting air into her stomach and bloodstream.
In a statement read to the public inquiry examining how Letby was able to attack babies, Child I's mother said: "I believe the doctors and nursing staff should have acted earlier."
She added: "Those in positions of authority at the hospital should have listened to them instead of trying to create their own narrative that Lucy Letby was a victim of bullying and harassment.
"Someone should have investigated the concerns fully at the time. This is what management are paid so handsomely to do. They shouldn't have been concentrating on saving their own skins and jobs and reputations.
"Babies died because someone in an office being paid hundreds of thousands of pounds didn't want the hospital to look bad if they shut the neonatal unit down while they investigated why so many babies were deteriorating when they should have been thriving."
She said "much more should have been done" after three babies had died within a short space of time in similar circumstances.
"Had prompt and effective action been taken at that time," the mother said, "so many other babies would have survived or not have suffered enduring life-changing harm.
"How many babies needed to die or be seriously harmed for action to be taken to stop Lucy Letby? Sadly, we all now know the answer.
"People paid huge salaries allowed this to happen. They made doctors apologise to Lucy Letby when she had murdered babies and continued to harm other babies.
"The Countess of Chester Hospital was totally blinded by self-preservation that they forgot why they exist - to remain true to the Hippocratic oath."
Letby, 34, from Hereford, will spend the rest of her life in prison after being convicted of murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven others.
The inquiry, being chaired in Liverpool by High Court judge Lady Justice Thirlwall, is expected to sit until early next year.
Her findings are expected to be published by the late autumn of 2025.
