Social Services forcibly remove baby by caesarean section...

[Workingman]

I agree Kaz, Shell, but the "something more to it" would have to be groundbreakingly unique for it to be acceptable for a woman to be sectioned, incarcerated against her will, held for five weeks, sedated, ripped open pre-term, have her baby removed, sewn back up and then eventually allowed to go home (without her baby) to her other children.

She is a foreign national who now has to go through our courts to get her baby back.

I also imagine that any extenuating circumstances used by the authorities to allow them to act in such a way would fade into insignificance when set against the rights of mother and baby if it was a British women undergoing similar treatment in another EU country.

[TheOstrich]

I think it's a horrifying incident, and the Social Services had better have an excellent reason - and had better make it public - for doing what they did.

[cromwell]

Can they do that though Os? Might there be an issue with client confidentiality?

[KateLMead]

We have mothers and pregnant women who have run away to avoid their children being snatched. I met one girl in Wales whose baby had been wrenched from her outside the court when I attended a meeting conducted by Brian Gerrish I was interested to learn more about Common Purpose.
I remember vividly pictures of distraught mothers screaming outside the court and in their homes as their babies are cruelly wrenched from their arms, police present to ensure the child is removed... and the tragic shocking case of the loving parents in Essex who, due to the mother being considered of low intelligence, whose loving husband had worked for the same company since leaving school, she had telephoned the SS for advice and was hounded from then onward the video of her and her distraught husband will remain with me forever.

Spotless home, beautiful baby loved by both
Other mothers have fled to Ireland and other areas to avoid these inhuman acts.
We also need to remember that the SS are given a golden handshake of 1m if they hit the required targets for adoption. Horrible damned country England Gt Britain has become.. We can also look at the shocking abuse of the elderly, the quality of carers who get away with dismissal not a prison sentence. these people make life difficult for good workers the Trust has gone.

[Aggers]

Kate - you paint a vivid picture that makes me want to cry.

I find so hard to believe some of the things that are now happening in this once-great country I was born in.

To be honest, I sometimes wonder whether things could have been much worse if we had lost WW2.
Perhaps the term 'SS' is appropriate.

[Kaz]

At face value this case is horrifying, really and truly shocking, but I am pretty sure there will be far more to it than we know, or that can be told, concerning this lady. She has a history of mental illness, a history of not taking her medications, two children already who are looked after by relatives in Italy..........There must be serious, serious doubt about her ability to care for this child for such drastic steps to have been taken. For an emergency c-sect to be enforced the baby must have been deemed to be in danger!

I do however think that the Italian courts should be dealing with this, and the child should not have been rushed into the UK adoption system, although I believe the adoption process will be halted whilst appeals are under way.

This isn't our business, it's up to the Italians in my opinion!

[KateLMead]

At face value this case is horrifying, really and truly shocking, but I am pretty sure there will be far more to it than we know, or that can be told, concerning this lady. She has a history of mental illness, a history of not taking her medications, two children already who are looked after by relatives in Italy..........There must be serious, serious doubt about her ability to care for this child for such drastic steps to have been taken. For an emergency c-sect to be enforced the baby must have been deemed to be in danger!

I do however think that the Italian courts should be dealing with this, and the child should not have been rushed into the UK adoption system, although I believe the adoption process will be halted whilst appeals are under way.

This isn't our business, it's up to the Italians in my opinion!

Kaz from what I understand her parents did want to take the child.. We also learn that the Italian authorities were aware of what was happening. This excuses nothing.
And this is not the only case Kaz that would cause any decent individual to tremble with disgust and shame that such behaviour is accepted and generally hidden from public scrutiny in this country... just like the child mutilation that I am sad to say is widespread in this supposed civilised country.. Aggers we may have Won the war, but we have Lost the peace.

[Workingman]

My beef was not with Social Services, but with the process, and although we are getting drips of information I am still concerned that not every option was thoroughly looked at before the nuclear one of a C-section was deemed the only one to take.

Why wasn't the woman given a MedEvac back to Italy? We do it with the injured and troops with PTSD all the time. She could then have been treated as per Italian laws in a language she fully understands and with her family to hand.

She might have become manic or suicidal; if so why wasn't she put on suicide or self-harm watch? We do it for criminals yet we cannot do it for an innocent pregnant woman? She could then have been stabilised and returned home.

Why wasn't she allowed to go full term? She had already spent five weeks in incarceration; what problems arose in that time to make a C-section an emergency, and how much did the incarcertaion influence the change?

Which part of the ECHR allows a foregn state to carry out a foced C-section against the will of the mother and then kidnap the baby?

The initial evaluation by Social Services might well have been the correct one, but it sure as hell raises some awkward questions about their procedures and decisions and those of the judicial and medical professions.

[Kaz]

I have no idea why - none of us do because there will be details of the case that the press are not allowed to release, for the sake of the mother's privacy. This happens a great deal in such cases, I have learnt!

We don't know why so we can all only surmise..................

[TheOstrich]

Can they do that though Os? Might there be an issue with client confidentiality?

Fair comment, Cromwell.

There was a report on this case on the BBC News tonight. If I understood it correctly, it indicated that the Italian courts had in fact ruled at one point that the child should be dealt with (i.e. looked after) by the British authorities - but no reason for this judgement was given. Which is an interesting twist .....