Mother force-fed baby to death

[rockin'robin]

LONDON (Reuters) - A nurse faces jail after killing her baby by force-feeding in the first case of its kind in Britain.

Gloria Dwomoh was found guilty at the Old Bailey on Wednesday of causing or allowing the death of her 10-month-old daughter Diamond.

She was said to be obsessed with the child's weight and poured liquidised food into her mouth when she was weaning her.

The baby died in March last year after being taken to a hospital near her home in Waltham Forest, east London, the Press Association reported.

A post-mortem examination found the child died from pneumonia caused by food, including meat and cereals, in her lungs.

Social workers and health professionals apologised for not saving the baby, the latest in a line of children let down by carers.

They said an investigation was being launched into feeding methods used by mothers, particularly those from cultures where bigger babies are considered to be healthier.

Dwomoh, who worked at St Thomas' Hospital in south London, had wept in court as she denied doing anything to harm her baby.

She said she and her siblings had been fed the same way by her mother in Ghana when she was weaning them onto solid food.

Dwomoh, 31, showed the jury two small china jugs, the size of cups, which she used for feeding.

In one jug she had made up feeds, including liquidised chicken soup, and then transferred small amounts into the other to give to her daughter.

However, the food had "gone down the wrong way" over months after the child had begun coughing and choking, prosecutor Andrew Edis said.

"This is a very sad case. She died because of the method by which her parents chose to feed her at the time she was being introduced to solid food.

"The allegation is one of force-feeding. If you have a child who is distressed and choking, you do not carry on," he added.

Waltham Forest Safeguarding Children's Board chair Laura Eades said care workers were determined to learn from the tragedy.

"Had best practice been followed, the risk to Diamond of force-feeding would have been better recognised and the family would have been offered further support and intervention," she said.

"The death of a child by force-feeding is extremely rare. To our knowledge, this case is the first of its kind in this country," she added.

Mother force-fed baby to death - Yahoo! News

 

[jazzy]

I never forced feed my babies and this I don't get it why would anyone worry about weight. I was skinny as toothpick as a kid and now look at me I am overweight. sad

 

[Beach girl]

How sad.

It's not clear to me exactly how social workers could have prevented this. They couldn't possibly be present at every meal-time for every baby in the country.

I find it believable, having lived in Ghana, that the woman's mother did indeed do something like that to wean her children, but obviously that woman did not emphasize the "force" part of it. I don't understand why any mother would continue feeding if the child is gasping and coughing.

Sad thing. What punishment would be fair? Parents who have left their children to die in hot cars sometimes avoid almost any punishment; in a way this seems like the same sort of thing. It doesn't appear that the mother intended the child to die.

 

[Audiofuzzy]

I found something:

Obsessed mother force feeds 10 month baby to death

Under the noses of social care workers

Even more disturbingly, the court heard that social workers, doctors and police could have prevented the death after they missed several clues.

* Knowing that all three of Dwomoh's older children suffered similar abuse and serious health problems as a result of inhaling food;
* Failing to follow up a warning at least four years before the baby's death that the shocking practice should stop;
* Being 'insufficiently sensitive' to the 'significance of cultural values' attached to eating in the family;
* A belief that Dwomoh's actions were motivated by genuine concern for her baby; and

Failure to intervene even after doctors realised one of her other children needed plastic surgery to repair a force-feeding injury.

People just don't care.

And the lady is perhaps mentally disturbed.
Her behavior may indicate OCD.


Fuzzy

 

[shel90]

Stories like these makes me want to hug my son so hard at night. He is so lucky that he wasnt born to abusive parents. Same with my daughter. Same with me especially that I was born to a teenaged mom.
Scary...these poor babies. *SMH*

 

[Beach girl]

That second article adds a lot more information. Yes, looks like the social workers definitely screwed up there, knowing that the woman's older children had been abused in the same way.

 

[JoeyDeafNinja]

Shameful

 

[Dixie]

Unfortunately in Ghana, the bigger women are seen as coming from families who are wealthy or their husbands are able to adequately provide for them if they are fat. Many girls are force fed later in life but still suffer abuse. The mother will inflict physical pain to the child, the pain stops if the child swallows more food. Children have eaten to the point of vomiting. After they vomit, the mother will force them to eat some more. Some have died of acute gastritis because they had more food in their bodies than what they could physically metabolize. It's sad. The parents know of the risks associated with the practice, but they do it anyway because it is tradition.

Something should be done if the child is sobbing and the mother is forcing the child to eat some more by shoving more food into the child's mouth.

 

[Giulia]

For me, cultural or not, she doesn't love her child.
Her child is becoming unhealthy, she was warned to stop, and she continues until her child dies from chocking.

I don't call her "a mother", I call her "a female parent".
She made her child born, but she doesn't love him. A loving mother doesn't make his child choke.

For me, this kind of female doesn't suffer, she just pretends she loves her child and that she suffers to have lost her.
She cries like a crocodile, she doesn't feel any kind of pain for having lost her child.
She doesn't need help. She doesn't love her daughter even if she claims and pretends to do so.

I still can't stand when someone finds excuses for such a behaviour. No, cultural matters are not excuses to hurt a child who has never asked to be born from such a female parent.
Those parents don't need help, they just need to be left without contacts with the children. Those die from indifference, in the street ? Be it, it's something I can only wish for those wastes.

Yes I am angry. Yes, I truly think that those parents who pretend to love their children don't deserve life (don't tell me about help and health care, it's too good for them).
And yes, I wish death penalty were still in vigour for those monsters who are no way better than trash.