The bodies of thousands of aborted and miscarried babies were incinerated as clinical waste in the United Kingdom, with some even used to heat hospitals, an investigation has found.
Ten NHS trusts have admitted burning foetal remains alongside other rubbish while two others used the bodies in “waste-to-energy” plants which generate power for heat.
The UK Department of Health issued an instant ban on the practice, which health minister Dr Dan Poulter branded “totally unacceptable”.
At least 15,500 foetal remains were incinerated by 27 NHS trusts over the last two years alone, Channel 4’s Dispatches discovered.
The programme, which aired on March 24, found that parents who lose children in early pregnancy were often treated without compassion and were not consulted about what they wanted to happen to the remains.
One of the country’s leading hospitals, Addenbrooke’s in Cambridge, incinerated 797 babies below 13 weeks gestation at their own “waste to energy” plant, the programme alleged.
The mothers were told the remains had been “cremated”.
Another “waste to energy” facility at Ipswich Hospital, operated by a private contractor, incinerated 1101 foetal remains between 2011 and 2013.
They were brought in from another hospital before being burned, generating energy for the hospital site.
Ipswich Hospital denied knowing that foetuses had been burned on its site.
Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which runs Addenbrooke’s stated that its disposal of foetal tissue complied with the recommendations from relevant medical authorities.
The trust said foetal remains had never been incinerated with waste.
Labour MP Jim Dobbin expressed his disgust at the revelations.
He said this “callous disregard for young humans is the fruit of 50 years of legal abortion in the UK”.
“And it is no use pro-choice people wringing their hands about treating unborn babies as clinical waste when it is their relentless dehumanisation of unborn life that has led us to this point.”
He called for a re-examination of how remains of aborted and miscarried babies are treated in medical facilities.
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