Midwife accused of causing baby deaths, disabilities on trial

THE Pretoria midwife Yolande Maritz Fouchee, who allegedly caused babies to either die or be born disabled while she was in charge of delivering them, is facing 14 charges in the Gauteng High Court, including one of culpable homicide.

- ZELDA VENTER

Fouchee, 48, now a deregistered nurse, denied any wrongdoing, and in a lengthy plea, explained that she did everything according to the book when she delivered the babies.

But one of the mothers, Carien Möller, yesterday testified that her daughter Sophia was born in July 2019 with cerebral palsy. She is blaming Fouchee for her child’s condition. Fouchee, in turn, claimed that the child was born this way because Möller had a bladder infection while she was pregnant and she refused to take antibiotics to clear it up.

The court was told that baby Sophia was blue in the face when she was born and that she had to be resuscitated for about 20 minutes before she could breathe normally.