Killer doctor shielded by her peers is finally struck off by judges
A DOCTOR found guilty of manslaughter over the sepsis death of a six-year- old boy was finally struck off yesterday.
Jack Adcock, who had Down’s syndrome and a heart condition, died at Leicester Royal Infirmary in 2011.
Hadiza Bawa-Garba, 40, the trainee paediatrician in charge of his care, marked the schoolboy ‘do not resuscitate’, having mixed him up with a child who had been discharged. She was convicted of manslaughter through gross negligence in 2015 and received a suspended jail sentence, with the trial judge declaring that her med- ical career had come to an end.
But the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service’s decision to impose only a 12-month suspension on the shamed medic last June was criticised by Jack’s family, and the General Medical Council mounted a High Court appeal.
The GMC asked two judges to quash the tribunal’s decision not to strike the doctor off, arguing that it was ‘not sufficient’ to protect the public or maintain public confidence in the profession.
There were claims she was being shielded by her peers after some
The Mail, December 9 800 doctors signed a petition against the GMC’s ‘unjust’ action, saying the watchdog had ignored the part short-staffing had played in Bawa-Garba’s mistakes. John Kirwan, a signatory and retired consultant rheumatologist, said: ‘Many of us feel the GMC is going beyond its role in challenging the tribunal panel in a way that’s going to make it very difficult for doctors to admit mistakes.’
Lord Justice Gross and Mr Justice Ouseley yesterday ruled in the council’s favour. Their ruling is effective immediately, meaning Bawa-Garba has been struck off.
The decision was welcomed by Jack’s mother, Nicola Adcock, who with her husband Victor, 52, had been campaigning for Nigerian Bawa-Garba to be struck off. Mrs Adcock, 43, said at their home in Glen Parva, Leicestershire: ‘We are elated. The court has made the right decision, but it should never have come to this. It should have been a suspension for life.
‘She had been found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter and how much more serious does that get for a doctor?’
Mrs Adcock added that BawaGarba – a mother of two whose husband lives in Dubai – had shown no remorse, ‘or any sign that she had done anything wrong’.
Mr Justice Gross said: ‘The jury convicted Dr Bawa-Garba of manslaughter by gross negligence. It necessarily follows that her failings on that day were “truly exceptionally bad”. That reality was not properly reflected or respected in the tribunal’s decision on sanction and, on the facts of this case, drives me to the conclusion … that the appropriate sanction must be erasure rather than suspension.’