Two more babies passed away in CWM Hospital last week

Two more babies have died at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at CWM Hospital last week.

The Ministry of Health and the World Health Organisation are still investigating whether the six babies that have died since last month all died from the same bacterium.

The Ministry earlier stated that the four babies that died from pre existing, life threatening conditions, including perinatal asphyxia, pneumonia and severe prematurity had contracted the acinetobacter baumanii bacterium.

The Ministry of Health says a common source of the bacteria has not been found and this is not unusual as sources are only identified in 50% of all outbreaks reported globally.

They say the presence of the multidrug resistant bacteria was detected by CWM laboratory services in samples obtained from Neonatal Intensive Care Unit patients.

The Ministry adds that this bacterium is commonly found in hospital settings and hospital patients around the world, and the bacterium poses very little risk to healthy people.

It says the bacteria can be a significant health risk to those with compromised immune systems.

The Ministry of Health says that they are working closely with WHO and the CWM team to respond to this current outbreak and ensure the safety of the hospital’s most vulnerable patients.

The Ministry adds that based upon their findings, this team will be providing recommendations for ensuring that the hospitals’ current processes are appropriate, and adequate systems are in place to ensure the delivery of quality clinical care and patient safety.

They add as part of the immediate response, CWM has increased surveillance in the hospital to support early response to new cases of infection and enhanced screening and infection precautions of all new admissions to the hospital and intensified its infection prevention and control measures.

The Ministry says a specialist team has also been deployed by WHO to Fiji to work with CWM to try and identify a source of the bacteria and to review current infection prevention and control practices within CWM.

As a further preventive measure, the Ministry is also examining practices in Lautoka and Labasa hospitals.

A similar outbreak of this bacterium occurred within the same ward at CWM hospital between December 2016 and March 2017.