“This Is Not My Baby”: Limpopo Mother Demands Justice After Being Given the Wrong Child to Bury
What was meant to be a final goodbye turned into a gut-wrenching mystery when Itumeleng Baloyi, 27years of age was informed by Matlala Hospital that the lifeless baby she had already buried was not hers.
“I looked at the baby and something didn’t feel right. But I trusted the hospital,” Baloyi said, holding back tears. “Now they tell me my real baby might still be in the morgue or worse, missing.”
Baloyi had delivered a stillborn child just days earlier. The hospital allegedly handed her a body for burial without proper identification. Four days later, staff called to say a "mistake" had been made. The baby she buried wasn’t hers.
The hospital has since offered to exhume the baby and conduct DNA testing. But for Baloyi and her family, the trauma is beyond repair.
“How does something like this happen? Are our children just numbers to them?” asked her aunt, visibly shaken.
Community members are outraged, with calls for accountability from the Department of Health and improved procedures in hospitals.
Medical experts say such errors, while rare, point to glaring system failures from poor recordkeeping to lack of body identification protocols. Baloyi has opened a formal case and is exploring legal action. “I want answers. I want to bury my child. And I want to make sure no mother ever goes through this again.”
As investigations continue, South Africans are watching closely and demanding that hospitals treat even the smallest lives with the dignity they deserve.
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