A SECOND baby deaths tragedy within a hospital trust in the Midlands has clear parallels with the Morecambe Bay national maternity scandal, a bereaved father claims.
Dalton patient safety campaigner James Titcombe has described a cluster of newborn deaths within the Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust between 2014 and 2016 as a repeat of failures that occurred at Barrow's Furness General Hospital over a nine year period.
Mr Titcombe OBE has now called for national health leaders to take immediate action to protect pregnant women and their babies from what he states is 'a dangerous focus' upon natural birth at all costs by some midwives.
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All recommendations laid out in the Morecambe Bay Investigation Report by Dr Bill Kirkup must be adopted as soon as possible to improve standards of maternity care across the country, he added.
"How many more deaths must happen before people realise that the backlash against medicalised births has gone too far and is costing lives," Mr Titcombe said.
"It's a tragedy that lessons have still not been learnt."
Recommendation 23 of the Morecambe Bay Investigation Report, published in March 2015, called for standardised investigations into the deaths of women and babies during childbirth.
More than two years on, it is one of many that has still not been implemented.
Now, the parents of two babies who died at Shrewsbury and Telford hospital trust claim their cases were never properly investigated by hospital bosses.
Mr Titcombe added: "There are many recommendations to improve maternity care for women and babies within the Morecambe Bay report, but very few of those intended for the wider NHS have been adopted.
"The families who have lost babies at Shrewsbury and Telford deserve answers just as much as those in Morecambe Bay.
"But we need strong national leadership on this issue to make the message clear."
Joshua Titcombe died aged nine days old after midwives at FGH failed to spot he had a treatable infection.
The Nursing and Midwifery Council failed to take any action against the midwives involved for eight years.
Dr Bill Kirkup, author of the Morecambe Bay Report, went on to conclude 11 babies and one mother had died as a direct result of poor standards of care and an over zealous pursuit of natural childbirth at any cost at FGH between 2004 and 2009.
Now, Mr Titcombe says it is crucial a planned external review of the NMC's handling of the Morecambe Bay cases by the Professional Standards Authority gets underway as soon as possible so opportunities for learning are not missed for the future.
PSA chief executive Harry Cayton yesterday confirmed the review, which will be led by the organisation's director of scrutiny and quality, Mark Stobbs, is soon to commence.
Mr Cayton said: "We have agreed terms of reference with the NMC and the Department of Health.
"We are confident of the full cooperation of the NMC and that we will have access to all necessary information and documents.
"We will make an announcement about the start of the review shortly."
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