Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
A GROUP THAT supports bereaved parents has condemned the lack of “dignity and respect” shown to children who were buried in coffins with unrelated adults.
The practice, known as “tandem burial”, was discussed in a 29 August letter – seen today by TheJournal.ie - from the HSE’s Tony O’Brien to Ambrose McLoughlin, then Secretary General of the Department of Health.
It appears from reports we have that on occasion and in exceptional circumstances, there was a practice where a neonate who died in hospital and where the other options for burial of this neonate (e.g. burial in a hospital or religious plot) were not selected, that the remains of the neonate would be placed in a coffin of another deceased person.
Ger O’Brien, from First Light – formerly known as the Irish Sudden Infant Death Association – told TheJournal.ie that the practice was another sign that “as a society, we haven’t respected the dignity of every child.”
The life of that child must be validated as being as important as any child.
O’Brien said that this was not done, since “their final resting place is not even identifiable.”
Marie Creegan, social worker at Féileacáin – the Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Association of Ireland – told TheJournal.ie her group had received up to 15 calls from worried parents since this morning.
This just brings to the fore once again that infants just don’t seem to count – we don’t value babies.
The letter – which emerged following a Freedom of Information request by RTÉ – says tandem burials took place “in a limited number of hospitals,” as confirmed by current and retired staff, in particular mortuary staff.
Ideally the awareness and understanding of both families involved would have been sought, though this is not guaranteed.
In a statement sent to TheJournal.ie this evening, the HSE emphasised that tandem burial was a “historical practice” which ended in the early 1980s, and “does not occur in HSE hospitals today.”
The scale of the practice is difficult to determine due to the changed landscape of all healthcare facilities, including maternity hospitals, from that time to today.
Furthermore, the record-keeping for such practices was not sufficiently comprehensive in order to allow a full picture in relation to the practice to be established.
Ger O’Brien warns that parents and families must not now be “retraumatised,” and called for the HSE and Department of Health not to systematically inform all parents.
For some people, it would just be too traumatic, some may actually prefer not to know.
And notifying everyone would take away their choice, which was done in the first place when the children were given the tandem burials.
Instead, she is calling for a clear time frame to be made public, so parents who think their children may have been involved can choose to come forward, if they wish.
“When they do come forward, the HSE should then facilitate them completely,” she added.
Sinn Féin TD Caoimhghín Ó’Caoláin has this evening called on the HSE to “establish the full extent of this practice,” calling it inappropriate and offensive to the families involved.
This is yet another distressful revelation that will cause considerable upset, for mothers who have lost children in birth or who had still births in the 1980s.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
This is some fecked up country we live in .
Same shiet now with child line struggling to stay open. Start helping our kids so our future is not bleak
It looks like us Irish ain’t so great
Why didn’t the bereaved parents bury the babies themselves?
Exactly !!!! Sometimes because they were so poor they probably couldn’t afford to and other times because the babies were not baptised and therefore could not be buried in consecrated ground !! Tandem burial was not carried our as an act if cruelty but rather as an act if kindness by a thoughtful mortuary worker so the little soul would get a Christian burial, even if it was with a stranger (!!), rather than being incinerated with hospital waste . The parents obviously never asked what would happen to the remains of their dead babies
When is all this going to come to an end? Is there no section of Irish society that does not have some sort of evil, disrespectable behaviour attached to it…….good, holy, Catholic Ireland…….every con, every scam, every underhanded stroke, every demeaning act that can be though up is or was common practice in the country……there is no section of society that has not been infected. I love Ireland, I do, but I’m beginning to wonder just what Ireland it is that I love?
It’s a kip.
I love Ireland too. I Love the Countryside, Lakes, Mountains, Trees. I love my land that I own,but that’s about it.
I don’t trust anyone, everything has to be checked and double checked in Ireland. Everything comes with bulshit in Ireland. Everything.
It’s like that everywhere. Sad but true. I’m from the U.S. Just remember that there are people with common senses and good hearts around also. I feel bad for the parents of those children.
Don’t really think it’s unique to Ireland unfortunately…
I understand what your say Fern and I appreciate your trying to make us feel better about ourselves…..but this is Ireland, we’re Irish….the country everyone wants to come to, the people who are loved all over the world (except the unionist in the north). We are a nation that has been subjugated for over 800 years. We know what its like to be treat like nothing more than scrapping off a boot. We fought and are still fighting for dignity and self respect…..we should know better. Are we a mirror image of our past masters? Once upon a time the religion of the country talked about the ‘dignity of life’……it breaks my heart to say that we have shown scant respect for our children, our women, our disabled or infirm……please tell me there are no more horrors to come.
Can somebody enlighten me?
How does this happen in practice?
An adult dies in a hospital, how is an infant placed in the coffin without the adults family or undertaker knowing?
It’s clearly happened but how does it happen without people knowing.
Why is there a need for it to happen?
I’m also struggling to understand it as well, Tom.
Well Tom and debi i am guessing this could be happening in convents and institutions run by nuns and brothers .the grave of the adult could be there for a number of years already. Simply open place baby and close no questions asked. But i cant see it being randomly done in glasnevin for example
I’d guess it is a more dignified resting place than the subjects of abortions will have.
No. It was done in hospitals. And wrong as it was, it was often done out of kindness because at the time, stillborn babies were not permitted to be buried in consecrated ground. This was a way of getting them buried in such ground.
The whole point of this, Jim Cantwell is that these babies were brought to term and either still born or lived only a few days. People who have abortions in Britain for fatal foetal syndrome, etc, at least have the opportunity of having the ashes sent back to them.
No abortion at all costs in this country but do what you like with the children once they’ve been born and maybe die shortly afterwards.
that poxy church again.
Thanks for clearing the confusion Paddy ….
When you think you have heard it all regarding how this country have treated our women, our babies, our children, our Gay community or our mentally challenged communities you haven’t.
What is wrong with us?????
A lady on the last word said that this would have been done for still borns and babies that died before they were christened so they could be buried on holy ground. You have to take into account that this stopped in 1980 and it was a very different Ireland back then in terms of beliefs I’m not saying it was right and I’m a firm believer that religion is a bad thing but surely it would be fair comment to say that there wasn’t any malice in it
Agree Michael as per my previous post.
What, another scandal?
Who thought this was OK?
I suppose people did this thinking it was the right thing to do. I hope so, anyway.
I regularly comment on articles in the papers but, this time I am just lost for words.
But you still managed to comment anyway, just couldn’t help yourself.
There is no point of informing families or even running this story. I’m all for more transparency and truth in mainstream media but this story needs to be taken down as it only serves to hurt families even more.
Instead we should just cover it up? The Church did that for long enough and look where that has got them?
That is just so wrong. I can understand a child being buried along with another sibling or parent or even grandparent.. But a stranger? That’s just not right at all!
horrible practice, but it was 30 years ago. I am reasonably sure it no longer happens
30 years isn’t that long ago.
But people still need to be held accountable. We have a massive issue with abuse and no accountability. Hoping bad things don’t happen in future isn’t good enough.
It finished 30 years ago. Prior to that it happened in many countries, worldwide, for 100s of years. Maybe, the babies are being looked after by the adults?
This was not abuse !!!! Stop trying to make a scandal out of acts of kindness .
This beggars belief. Just when will these types of revelations end?
I do agree with Ger. Parents should not now just be contacted out of the blue. If parents want to inquire, they should be free to do so but for those who do not want to know, they should not be just contacted without their prior request.
We’ve had Ger and First Lights support since the death of our first born son in 2011 and this lady is nothing short of amazing. She travels the length and breadth of the country to meet with and arrange support for bereaved parents.
Leo , oh Leo – you’re up again ..come on now don’t be shy – you weren’t with your 3 quid earlier !
Maybe Confident Enda – who was a T.D. at the time would better to answer it actually !
You’re blaming Leo, our present minister for health for something that happened 30 years? Jesus Dermot you really have the intelligence of a sack of potatoes.
He must have been the youngest TD ever and the youngest Minister for Health so, Dermot. According to Wikipedia, Leo Varadkar was born in 1979. That would be taking precocity a bit too far!
Our generation cannot be held responsible for the actions of past generations. All staff involved will be retired or dead. Let it go
UM I agree, all of this is very hurtful for those involved but where does it all end…. I was smacked and humiliated in school in the early 60′s, spent years in hospital as a child where nobody ever told you what they were going to do to you, treated like meat..never saw your siblings, your parents for an hour if you were lucky…is that abuse?, it wasn’t then, but it would be now and wouldn’t happen now…different times, and I don’t want to sound hard but some things are best left alone…
Dear Joan, I am very sorry to see this. In answer to your question, yes it was abuse. I am, hoever, heartened to see that people will no longer be silent on such matters. We have evolved into the society we are today because brave people, who were intially villified, spoke up. And lancing boils hurts, but it allows the poison to leave our body. Keeping such societal poisin in makes it fester and spread in the body. That’s how Ireland used to do it. Lets not go back to that.
It is not so long ago that they were buried outside the wall of graveyards in unmarked unconsecrated ditches
Tites
Weird and traumatic like Aras Attracta
Terrible what is hidden and goes on
We can do something about aras attracta but we can’t rewrite history or change the past.
Irish institutions are a complete disaster, incapable, self-serving, cruel and unkind, truly power in Ireland seriously corrupts.
Hasn’t changed much.
I have to disagree with this report. my father Gerry Foley was an undertaker in Sligo from 1946, I worked with him from 1965, and left in 1987 to come to live in Australia.
I can honestly say there never was a stillborn infant put into an adult coffin by late father, me, or, my late brother Tony at Sligo Hospital. Rarely, and I mean very rarely, a fetus from a miscarriage may have been put at the foot of the deceased in a coffin. This was because the porter requested this, otherwise the fetus would have been placed in the incinerator.
In fact, circa 1983 a nun in a private nursing home asked me to inter a fetus from a miscarriage. She had put it in a small jar of formaldehyde, with the request I put it with an adult. It was a beautiful formed little tot, no bigger than my thumb. I interred the infant with a man who had no family in Sligo, and when I told his family overseas they were very pleased.
There are more important things going on about the living today, to be getting hot under the collar about.
There used to be a tradition that a stillborn infant should be interred in an ancestral grave. People of today should also realise that the majority of births took place at home until late 1950/early 1960 when more gynecologists were trained.
Thanks Declan an educated witness is worth all the talk in Dail Eireann …
It’s about time we apologised to Wales for the kidnapping of St Patrick. Or France. Or where ever he was from. Outrageous. Kidnapping a kid and putting him to work herding sheep…
Ah, stop. Welsh lads love spending time with sheep.
Ooh, Paul. Durty!
None of these parents have looked to visit a grave in over 30 years. I have no doubt this practice was carried out without malice. It was the christian thing to do, get these innocent souls buried on consecrated ground. The parents should take some comfort in this. Last thing we need is another long draen out costly inquiry.
I have always said if you are young, old, sick, poor or a combination of any of the above then this country does not care for you. A shameful place.
Doesn’t care apart from the massive dole payments, pensions, childrens allowance, medical cards, council housing and a ton of other free or cheap stuff that Ireland hands out left, right and centre to the young, old, sick, unemployed and just about any other randomer that shows up with their hand out.
Of course, those who work for a living take it up the arse to pay for all that stuff.
more outrage about ireland the church etc learn from it and move on. I’m sure it happened in other countries also.
If it happened in other countries does that make it al-right?
Awful treatment of these poor souls and such disrespect to those already interred.
Religion poisons everything!
this was one god awful kip of a country scandal after scandal.
You have absolutely no idea, Paul, what it was like growing up in Ireland in the 50′s and 60′s. It was bad enough in Dublin.
Can you imagine what it must have been like living down in a small village in the country if you didn’t quite fit in?
I reckon “Ryan’s Daughter” held up a mirror to us but even then we were still too brainwashed to appreciate it fully.
This is just horrific!….and also really, really weird. The mind boggles..
have your say