Woman, news site founder fined for fake KKH miscarriage story

A woman who fabricated a story about suffering a miscarriage at KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH) and the founder of alternative news site Wake Up, Singapore (WUSG), who published the false account, were both fined by a district court on Aug 26.

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Ma Su Nandar Htwe, a 28-yearold Myanmar national and Singapore permanent resident, and WUSG's founder Ariffin Iskandar Sha Ali Akbar, a 27-year-old Singaporean, each pleaded guilty to a charge of criminal defamation.

Ma Su Nandar Htwe, who admitted to submitting the fake story because she "wanted drama", was fined $10,000.

Ariffin was fined $8,000. He published the story just 20 minutes after e-mailing KKH, before the hospital could reply.

The court heard that Ma Su Nandar Htwe sent the false account to WUSG's Instagram account on March 21, 2022. In it, she claimed she tested positive for Covid-19 in February 2022 when she was 20 weeks pregnant.

She claimed she arrived at KKH at 2pm that day and started bleeding from her vagina at about 5pm.

She said she could see a doctor only at 6pm and he told her: "No need ultrasound, the baby is probably dead, this is too much bleeding." She claimed she "expelled" the baby on a hospital bed and lost consciousness. She added that she later asked for her baby's body to give it a proper burial but was told by KKH that the foetus had been "disposed of as medical waste".

Deputy Public Prosecutor Sheldon Lim said all her claims were lies, except the fact that she was pregnant when she visited KKH on Feb 28 to seek treatment for Covid-19 and abdominal pain.

She was discharged from KKH on the same day in good health and delivered her son safely on July 6, 2022.