Two babies have died and another is now in critical conditions after being anesthetized for free cleft lip and cleft palate surgery offered by the Center for Researching and Aiding Smile Operation (OSCA), a Hanoi-based non-governmental charity, on Saturday. Nguyen Quang Minh, a 14-month-old baby boy of south-central Khanh Hoa Province’s Nha Trang City, died at Khanh Hoa Province General Hospital at 2:20 pm on Sunday, the hospital confirmed. About an hour earlier, Nguyen Ngoc Tuyet Van, an 11-month-old baby girl, also of Nha Trang, died following a deep coma and brain death at the same hospital, said Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Huy, deputy head of the Pediatrics Department. Around 11:00 am on Saturday, another baby boy, Pi Nang Tuan Huu, was taken to the same infirmary in critical conditions, doctors said. Tuan is currently on a respirator and has suffered from blood sugar disorders, electrolyte disorders, and serious liver and kidney failure, they elaborated. The three babies were transferred on Saturday to Khanh Hoa Province General Hospital from Military Hospital 87, also based in Nha Trang, where OSCA experts had anesthetized them for surgery, said Dr. Nguyen Ba Hanh, director of the military clinic. The babies were in normal health condition when they were anesthetized. But when they were brought to the operation room, the three turned blue and suffered serious respiratory failure.

The three babies were among the 11 patients who received free operations from the OSCA at the military infirmary on Saturday, Dr. Hanh said. On Sunday afternoon, the OSCA’s health worker group halted their operations at Military Hospital 87 after the deadly incidents, hospital doctors said.Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper correspondents tried to look for OSCA group members at the hospital for comment the same day but they could not find any of them. “We have no longer seen them [OSCA members] there and we don’t know where they are,” Dr. Hanh said. “Doctors at the hospital are really surprised by the fact that the three babies had to be transferred for emergency aid shortly after they were anesthetized.”

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