Helga Wauters imprisoned for three years and banned from practising after death of Xynthia Hawke
An alcoholic anaesthetist who botched an emergency caesarean operation leaving a young British mother dead has been sentenced to three years in prison and banned from practising medicine.
Helga Wauters, 51, was found guilty of manslaughter after pushing a breathing tube into 28-year-old Xynthia Hawke’s oesophagus instead of her windpipe. Even after Hawke cried out in pain, vomited, turned blue and went into cardiac arrest, the anaesthetist, who admitted she had an alcohol problem and had been drinking since early morning on the day of the operation, failed to react.
