GDN:’Kill your unborn baby’ maid told

By EUNICE del ROSARIO
Published: 25 September 2006

PHILIPPINE Embassy officials have launched an investigation after a housemaid claimed she was advised by a recruitment agency in the Philippines to jump from a building or take excessive painkillers to have a miscarriage.

Fe Lastimosa Saludar, aged 33, says she miscarried her four-month-old foetus after falling down the stairs at her Bahraini employer’s home, in Riffa, last month.

However, medical examiners in the Philippines and Bahrain allegedly failed to detect the pregnancy.

She told the GDN that she was not aware that she was already a month pregnant with her fourth child when she arrived in Bahrain in May this year.

By EUNICE del ROSARIO
Published: 25 September 2006

Fe Lastimosa Saludar, aged 33, says she miscarried her four-month-old foetus after falling down the stairs at her Bahraini employer’s home, in Riffa, last month.

However, medical examiners in the Philippines and Bahrain allegedly failed to detect the pregnancy.

She told the GDN that she was not aware that she was already a month pregnant with her fourth child when she arrived in Bahrain in May this year.

An embassy spokeswoman confirmed that a doctor in the Philippines examined Mrs Saludar, a mother-of-three hailing from Zamboanga, prior to her departure for Bahrain.

“This procedure is to determine that the worker is fit to work,” said the spokeswoman.

“Very rarely do cases like this happen, but when it does we take it very seriously.”

Mrs Saludar said the medical examiner back home told her that her pregnancy test, which was part of the routine doctor’s examination, came out negative.

“He only said that I was lacking nutrition and that I had to eat better,” she said.

The spokeswoman said that the results of the exam in Bahrain, which also included a pregnancy test, did not reveal the maid was pregnant.

“Because I already have three children of my own, I had a feeling I might be pregnant a few weeks after arriving in Bahrain,” said Mrs Saludar.

“I was throwing up and feeling sick.

“I told my employer that I might be pregnant, so they were nice enough to buy me a home pregnancy test – which later showed that I was definitely pregnant.

Despite her pregnancy, Mrs Saludar said she continued to work.

She said she contacted agency officials here, who contacted the agent in the Philippines, who told her to jump off a building or take an excessive dose of painkillers, to cause a miscarriage.

“One day in August, when I was cleaning the ceiling fan, I slipped and fell down,” she added.

She was taken to Salmaniya Medical Complex by her employers and was later told by doctors that she had miscarried.

“I felt so sad,” she said.

“I did not intend for any of this to happen.

“If I had known I was pregnant, I wouldn’t have left (the Philippines).”

Mrs Saludar sought the assistance of the embassy earlier this month, claiming that she had not been paid her month’s salary of BD60. “I told my boss I wanted to go home, but I was told I had to buy my own ticket home,” she said.” The maid is currently one of the more than 60 workers staying at the embassy’s shelter.

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