Child death rate hit almost 70 percent at Cork mother and baby home

IRELAND
Irish Central

Patrick Counihan @irishcentral August 25,2014

A new mother-and-baby home scandal has come to light with reports of a near 70 per cent mortality rate at Bessborough in Cork in the 1940s.

The shocking new report, carried in the Irish Examiner newspaper, highlights government concerns at the time over the infant death rates.

The story comes just two months after the Tuam scandal which prompted the establishment of a state commission to investigate practices, deaths, illegal adoptions and vaccine trials at the country’s mother-and-baby homes.

The Irish Examiner reports that previous research done by adoption campaigners indicated a death rate of around 50% and above at Bessborough throughout the late 1930s and 1940s.

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