Rats Ate Your Baby; Kawempe Referral Hospital Under Probe Over Claims Of Rat Eating New Borne Baby

Police are looking into Kawempe National Referral Hospital after a couple questioned the circumstances surrounding the death of their newborn, whose face was allegedly “eaten” by a rat, according to a doctor at the facility.

The parents, Yvonne Ainembabazi, 20, and Sulaiman Waiswa, 30, believe their first child was a victim of ritual sacrifice since a severe incision on the left side of the face was incongruous with rat bites.

They informed the police that when they arrived at the hospital on July 20, anonymous health staff tried to refer them “elsewhere,” alleging that their child needed undefined external care, but they refused.

The mourning family and Kawempe Hospital both confirmed that the infant boy was delivered normally at Lwanyanga, a private clinic in Kampala’s Rubaga Division, at the age of eight and a half months, but was referred for care in a nursery.

According to police, using the parents’ testimony, the infant was placed on oxygen on the third day of arrival without notification or explanation, a choice that was followed by the withholding of further information on the baby’s dying moments.

The boy was confirmed dead about 9:30 p.m. on the same day, and his body was reportedly sent to the mortuary.

Mr Fred Mutebi, the deceased’s grandfather, said a doctor, whose identity we are keeping for legal reasons, barred the parents from viewing their dead baby’s body that evening — both at the nursery and in the mortuary.

When the couple and family arrived the following morning to collect the body, they found a peculiar deep wound on the face, and the same doctor warned them, “you did bad to leave the dead [body] without a coffin.” “The rats have eaten the baby’s brow.”

“We asked them what they were doing on the dead child’s head, and can the rat eat like this?” “They started telling us to forgive them,” Mr Mutebi said, adding, “We want to know what happened to the baby’s body and why they opened the head.” The rat’s brow cannot be opened…”