Istanbul, Turkey (AFP) Dozens of suspects went on trial in Istanbul Monday over the deaths of at least 10 newborn babies as part of a vast social security fraud scheme in Turkey’s worst health scandal in years.

As the trial of the so-called “newborn baby gang” opened, the courtroom was packed with family members and reporters, with 47 suspects due to testify over the coming weeks.

Prosecutors believe a network of private hospital staff, from managers to doctors along with emergency call operators and ambulance drivers, conspired to send healthy newborns to certain neonatal care units for financial gain.

Giving the parents false medical grounds, the defendants allegedly kept some of the infants in intensive care needlessly, sometimes for weeks at a time.

Other babies who were in need of specialised care, did not receive the treatment they needed.

The aim was to secure a social security payment of 8,000 Turkish lira ($230) per day which is granted to private hospitals treating newborns on top of the fee charged to the parents.

The profits were then shared out between them.

The indictment, which is almost 1,400 pages long, said at least 10 babies died as a result of negligence and improper treatment over several years.

The inquiry began in May 2023 and by the end of October, investigators were looking into some 350 complaints, Turkish media reports said.

– ‘Barbaric’ –

“The night I gave birth, my baby was fine, he was healthy. The next day, they told us he had three deep-vein thrombosis, high blood pressure and was in respiratory distress,” Nazli Ahi, who gave birth at a private Istanbul hospital in April 2023, told the Anadolu news agency.

“Then they said they were going to transfer him” to a neonatal intensive care unit at another hospital, she said.

A few days later, her baby boy was declared dead.

“If they had told us they need money, I would have given them billions if they would just give me my child back,” she said.

The authorities have closed nine private hospitals in Istanbul and a neighbouring province, including one run by a former health minister from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s AKP party, who served from 2013-2016.

And nine other health centres are being investigated.

The defendants face a string of charges, including “wilful negligent homicide”, conspiracy to defraud public institutions and establishing an organisation “with the aim of committing a crime”.

If convicted, they collectively risk several hundred years behind bars.

Erdogan, who has said he was “personally” following the developments, has promised the “severest possible” punishment for “those responsible for this barbarity”.