Newborn died after gas mix-up at Lidcombe-Bankstown hospital in 2016

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The people allegedly responsible for fatally giving a newborn baby nitrous oxide at a Sydney hospital two years ago will face criminal charges.

Baby John Ghanem died after he was accidentally given nitrous oxide instead of oxygen at Lidcombe-Bankstown hospital in July 2016.

Another baby, Amelia Khan, was left with permanent brain damage in a similar mix-up at the same hospital a month earlier.

Senior staff were stood down at the time but on Wednesday Safework NSW confirmed it had filed criminal charges for the matter.

Five sets of criminal charges have been levelled at the state government’s South-West Sydney Local Health District, the gas company and the man who installed the gas, the Nine Network reported on Wednesday.

A report released in August 2016 pointed to “a series of tragic errors” at the hospital including incorrect installations of gas pipelines, flawed testing and significant clinical and management failures.





