Neonatal nurse killed five babies as she ‘played God’ giving chemical injections

Brenda Cecilia Agüero killed five babies by injecting them with potassium or insulin. Eight other children were also affected, two of them with life-changing injuries

A nurse is now behind bars after she was found guilty on five counts of murder after the deaths of five babies in a neonatal unit^[1] and the attempted murder of eight others.

In June, a jury in the Argentine city of Córdoba found nurse^[2] Brenda Cecilia Agüero guilty of five counts of aggravated murder and eight counts of attempted murder. Prosecutors said she killed the children by injecting them with potassium and insulin.

The case that has shocked many in Argentina^[3] saw Agüero sentenced to life behind bars. Agüero, who is now in jail at Bouwer Penitentiary, will be eligible for parole after 35 years.

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The disturbing case began in March 2022 at Hospital Materno Neonatal Ramón Carrillo in Córdoba. An infant that was healthy and stable suddenly began experiencing cardiorespiratory distress.

The baby survived, but more infants experienced heart or breathing distress in the following weeks. A formal investigation was launched when two neonatologists highlighted their concerns and made a judicial complaint.

Then on June 6 and June 7, 2022, two babies died and two others nearly perished during the same shift, according to a report by the Buenos Aires Herald. Families and staff described seeing needle marks including a “prick in the back”. This led doctors to get together and question procedures.

With suspicions already raised, autopsies were carried out and found high levels of potassium in two of the deceased children, according to prosecutors. Insulin levels in some of the newborns affected were also found to be higher than in adults in the advanced stages of pancreatic cancer.

Experts said that the high levels indicated medicine had been administered without a valid health reason behind it. A mother of one of the children said she saw Agüero take her child away and thenurse returned the child a short while later just before her infant stopped breathing.

Out of the eight children that survived, one suffered severe and irreversible neurological damage linked to the insulin they were given. And after receiving a potassium injection in the back, another child developed severe scoliosis.

Agüero was finally arrested and then charged on August 19, 2022, La Nación^[6] reported. But through the case and in the months after her conviction, Agüero has maintained her innocence.

“I am not that monster that they have created in the media. I understand the pain of the mothers, but I am not the serial killer that they made everyone believe,” she said in her final statement in court, the Buenos Aires Herald reported. Agüero claims she was the scapegoat for systemic failures at the hospital.

During the trial, psychiatric evaluations of Agüero said she had eccentric traits including enjoying the suffering of others, a lack of empathy and narcissism. Her alleged motivation was the advance of her own career. Attorney Daniela Morales Leanza said Agüero was “playing god”.

“She decided who lived and who died,” she said. Five other people from the hospital, as well as provincial health officials were also convicted for concealment and omission-of-duty counts, Chequeado^[7] reported.

The news outlet reported that the convicted includes Alejandro Escudero Salama, an administrative sub-secretary who received a sentence of 64 months in jail. The former head of neonatology Martha Gómez Flores was slapped with five years behind bars. Patient-safety coordinator María Luisa Moralez; her sentence was suspended. Pablo Carvajal, the ex-provincial health secretary, was given a suspended four-year sentence.

Until the judgment is final, the five remain free under bond conditions.