MOTHERS seeking compensation over the deaths of their babies at the Port of Spain General Hospital are not willing to accept settlements without an admission of liability by the North West Regional Health Authority (NWRHA).
In correspondence dated May 7, 2024, to the NWRHA’s external attorneys, Pollonais, Blanc, de la Bastide & Jacelon (PBDJ), Freedom Law Chambers, headed by senior counsel Anand Ramlogan, said its clients were prepared to settle their claims but would not do so on terms that absolved the authority of responsibility.
The firm, in a response signed by attorney Sue Ann Deosaran, was addressing an invitation by the NWRHA to submit compensation proposals. It said the mothers viewed payments without an admission of liability as equivalent to accepting “hush money” and wanted to ensure that any settlement would not silence them.
“This is not simply about money as the NWRHA seems to think,” the attorneys wrote, adding that the families wanted justice based on the truth and remedial measures to prevent other mothers from suffering similar losses.
The firm disclosed that it was representing families in claims involving a total of 19 babies who had died at the hospital. It said it had not issued pre-action protocol letters for every mother who approached it, as each case was assessed to determine whether there were reasonable grounds for a medical negligence claim.
A major obstacle to determining compensation, the lawyers argued, was the absence of an independent medical expert report. They said such evidence was essential to advising the mothers on the merits and value of their claims, and contended that the NWRHA’s refusal to fund independent expertise left the families at a disadvantage.
The attorneys also challenged the pace and transparency of the authority’s internal investigation into the deaths, which occurred between April 4 and 9, 2024. They questioned why the investigation remained incomplete nearly a month later after the deaths and demanded a deadline for its conclusion, along with a commitment to provide the findings to the families within 24 hours of completion.
They further argued that the investigation policy supplied by the NWRHA lacked important details about the selection of investigators, safeguards for independence and transparency, and the timeframe for completing the process. The firm also questioned why the policy and the patient charter of rights were not prominently displayed on the authority’s website.
The correspondence defended the mothers’ decision to appeal publicly for financial assistance to hire a foreign medical specialist. It said they had been excluded from both the NWRHA’s internal investigation and the Pan American Health Organization’s (PAHO) investigation, while the authority had declined to help cover the cost of independent medical expertise.
The attorneys also disclosed that the NWRHA had spent $26.2 million in legal fees fighting medical negligence claims between September 2015 and January 1, 2024.
They urged the authority to reconsider its position on funding independent medical experts, arguing that the resulting evidence could help establish whether negligence had occurred.
The correspondence comes amid renewed criticism by Ramlogan over the absence of compensation for the bereaved families after two years of litigation.
Last Thursday, Justice Robin Mohammed ordered the NWRHA to release its internal investigative report into the deaths of seven newborns during a bacterial outbreak at the Port of Spain General Hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit. The judge criticised the authority’s reliance on legal professional privilege to withhold the report, describing it as a “construct of convenience”.
