A 27-year-old woman was charged on May 6 for her alleged involvement in spreading a fabricated story of her miscarriage at KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH).

Ma Su Nandar Htwe, a Myanmar national and Singapore permanent resident, was charged with one count of criminal defamation.

An article supposedly about her experience, “The baby is probably dead – woman shares a harrowing account of her miscarriage at KKH A&E”, was published on the website, Facebook and Instagram accounts run by Wake Up Singapore (WUSG).

She was alleged to have defamed the hospital as she made an “imputation” concerning KKH that would "harm" its reputation, her charge sheet said.

Her passport has been impounded, CNA reported.

Background

The woman had allegedly sent WUSG messages over Instagram to convey her supposed account of how she suffered a miscarriage at KKH.

She had intended for the story to appear on the platform.

The false report said the woman arrived at KKH to seek treatment after experiencing severe abdominal pains at 2pm that day.

She was reportedly 20 weeks pregnant and Covid-19 positive at that time.

The claims published in the report included details about how the woman was apparently told to wait at a drop-off area, and she started to bleed at 5pm, but was not attended to.

Only after a supposed four-hour wait until 6pm was she attended to by a doctor, she claimed.

She was then told she had lost her baby.

The woman then accused the hospital of throwing out her foetus as medical waste.

KKH later said the woman was seen by a doctor within an hour of her arrival.

The hospital said she did not suffer a miscarriage.

Police investigations found the woman's claims to be false.

In March 2022, a correction direction was issued to WUSG for the false account's publication.

The Ministry of Health instructed the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act Office to issue the correction direction.

WUSG subsequently apologised and its Facebook and Instagram accounts published the correction notices on Mar. 27, 2022.

First person charged

Ariffin Iskandar Sha Ali Akbar, 26, who is reportedly the administrator of WUSG, was the first person to be charged on Apr. 24, 2024.

He is set to appear in court again on May 24.

The penalty for defamation is a jail term of up to two years, a fine, or both.

Top photo via Google Maps