The National Anticorruption Center (NAC) responded to the statement signed by 98 women who complained about abuses in the prenatal care system of the Republic of Moldova. “Given that the persons who related the cases didn’t submit a denouncing statement or an application to hold a particular person accountable, the given petition cannot be examined in accordance with the procedural-penal norms,” says the NAC’s response. According to the institution, the information from the petition will be used for operational purposes.
At the petitioners’ request to adopt the law on whistle-blowers, the NAC will transmit the finalized bill to the Government so that this goes through all the stages in the immediate period and ultimately reaches Parliament.
Contacted by IPN, Alina Andronache, co-author of the statement, said that together with the signatories of the statement and the petition launched online, she will monitor the situation to see how the NAC fulfills the assumed commitments so that these do not remain only promises. The activist noted that the Office of the People’s Ombudsperson also reacted to the petition, but said that it will make public an official answer and a recommendation letter to the NAC later. The Government and the Ministry of Health, Labor and Social Protection haven’t yet reacted.
Alina Andronache said that if the competent authorities do nothing during a week, they will submit another petition, signed by over 5,000 persons already, so as to show that not only 98 women want changes in this field.
The common statement signed by 98 women who suffered as a result of the interaction with the prenatal care system of Moldova was submitted to the Government, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Social Protection, the Office of the People’s Ombudsperson, the National Anticorruption Center and international organizations working in Moldova on January 12. These were requested to take measures in accordance with their powers.
The petition was launched after a young woman related through a social networking site that she had to give birth alone in the toilet of the Mother and Child Institute of Chisinau as a result of medical abortion recommended in the 21st week of pregnancy owing to congenital malformations in the fetus.
