Traumatised moms have midwife investigated

Madelein Roux, 20, from Limpopo, wanted to give natural birth after a previous caesarean experience.

She hired a Pretoria midwife, Yolande Maritz, who suggested a stretch-and-sweep procedure to induce labour. The baby was stillborn.

Maritz is being investigated by the South African Nursing Council for alleged negligence and irregular use of drugs to induce labour after some babies born at her You and Me Home Birth Centre were either stillborn or disabled.

Council CEO Sizo Mchunu said the council had received six complaints about the centre, some going back to 2016.

Roux is one of six women who complained to the council.

Carien Moller, 31, of Pretoria, said she was eight weeks pregnant when she began consulting Maritz. Her baby girl was born braindamaged, and Moller has laid a complaint of negligence, misuse of medication and assault with the council.

Jacobus Fouche, of JPA Venter Attorneys, representing Maritz, said his client was a highly qualified and skilled medical professional who was passionate about her work.

“She has great empathy for the parents concerned and shares in their grief,” he said. “She strongly denies any wrongdoing and/or negligence.”

He said Maritz would present medical records and proof to the council, “which will [corroborate] her version and which will exonerate her”.

Today marks three years since Tania Brown’s baby was born. Brown, 28, who now lives in Ireland, said: “I call him my miracle baby after he spent five weeks and two days in the neonatal intensive care unit.”

Brown laid a complaint of birth injury, severe trauma, childbirth injury (oxygen deprivation and respiratory complications) and negligence against Maritz.