A severe shortage of nurses could have led to the outbreak of a resistant bacteria that reportedly killed a number of babies at the Victoria Jubilee Hospital in Kingston during the summer, according to the Minister of Health and Wellness, Dr Christopher Tufton.

While the minister has confirmed that babies have died, he is disputing that dozens died, as reported by Nationwide News Wednesday evening.

“The insinuation that somehow dozens of babies have died is not the information that I have but every death is regrettable and so it is not an excuse. We have the problem and we have some challenges in dealing with it but we are dealing with it,” Tufton told the radio station.

He also revealed that the ratio of nurses to babies in the neonatal intensive care unit should be one nurse to two babies. However, with Jamaica plagued by a severe nursing shortage due to the high number of nurses migrating each year, Tufton said “we’re now at one (nurse) to seven (babies) and sometimes more”.

“And it does create a challenge for infection prevention and control,” Tufton added.

Deaths were reportedly recorded in June, July and August but the public was kept in the dark.

A whistleblower reportedly said that both healthy and sick babies were affected.

Additionally, it has been reported that mothers who have returned to the hospital for post-natal checks ups are being affected by the resistant bacteria.

The situation was blamed on a breakdown in infection controls at Victoria Jubilee. Despite their best efforts, the staff was unable to bring the situation under control and the Ministry of Health and Wellness sought the assistance of the Pan American Health Organization, PAHO.

Reports are that the Bustamante Hospital for Children may also have been affected by the bacteria and the PAHO team visited that facility as well.

The health ministry has been accused of attempting to cover up the problem which is only being made public several months after the outbreak started.