A 27-year-old woman in labor was turned away by staff at a referral hospital in Phnom Penh’s Russei Keo district on Tuesday and later gave birth to a baby girl on a small patch of dirt next to the city’s railroad.

Ministry of Health officials on Wednesday expressed regret about the hospital’s behavior and said the midwife responsible for denying treatment had been transferred to another department inside the hospital.

Chea Chet went in to labor in the morning and made her way to Samdech Euv Referral Hospital, where she said a midwife told her that hospital staff were not working.

Heading home through the poor neighborhood that skirts the railroad, Ms. Chet gave birth outdoors without any medical assistance. While both the mother and the baby survived the ordeal and are now recuperating in Calmette Hospital, Ms. Chet and her family on Wednesday condemned the hospital’s actions and claimed they were refused treatment because they are poor.

Continue reading: Hospital Denies Treatment to Woman in Labor

Source: (The Cambodia Daily – February 15, 2013)