Vaccine Victim's Dad Refuses To Bury Him After 21 Years

A father who has refused to bury his baby son for 21 years is involved in a bitter last ditch battle to prevent council chiefs organising a funeral against his wishes.

Four-month-old Christopher Blum died in June 1987 but lies frozen in a hospital mortuary, unburied, because his father Steve believes a contaminated vaccine was to blame for his death.

But now Enfield Council in North London is preparing to close Christopher's file and lay him to rest.

Tragedy: Christopher Blum was just four months old when he died in 1987

The body of baby Christopher is in a freezer drawer marked 'Baby Blum: Deceased' at North Middlesex Hospital . His tiny frame is kept at minus 8C (17.6F).

It costs £15 week to keep him there. Mr Blum is billed regularly for Christopher’s stay.

The council now claims it no longer needs Mr Blum's consent to bury him. Last week my Bloom was informed by the council that it no longer needed his consent to bury his son.

Mr Blum has been told he has until August 18 to say where he wants Christopher buried and what's written on the headstone, or the council will go ahead and make the funeral arrangements itself.

Christopher’s mother, Mary, had taken him to the North Middlesex Hospital to have his inoculation against whooping cough, polio and tetanus.

'He threw up straight away,' Mr Blum said. 'They sorted that out and he came home.

'He was sort of lethargic. We put him to bed about seven or eight in the evening. I went to check him at about half past nine.

'His fists were clenched up to the sides of his head and his face was down on the pillow. I picked him up and as soon as I did I knew something was wrong.

'He wasn't floppy like a baby, he was rigid. There was blood coming out of his nose. I screamed and went running downstairs with him.

'My neighbour tried to give him the kiss of life and was pushing his chest. We suspected the vaccine straight away.'

Post mortem blood tests show the baby had a blood infection that may have been caused by a contaminated triple vaccine given to him just hours before he died.

A pathologist's report alleged the child had died from cot death. Mr Blum claimed the presence of the infection in his blood and organs showed it couldn't have been a cot death.

But the authorities insist the infection got into the blood sample accidentally in the laboratory.

Two sets of back up samples that could have confirmed the infection found in the first sample came from Christopher that have gone missing and have never been produced.

Christopher's organs are also missing and Mr Blum cannot find out from the authorities where they have gone.

Files relating to the case have also vanished, Later Mr Blum discovered that Christopher's post mortem had been carried out by a discredited pathologist who allowed mortuary attendants to remove organs from bodies in his absence.

Mr Blum challenged the results of two postmortems, backed by Action for Victims of Medical Accidents, but his demand for an inquest was refused. The group no longer backs him.

A bitter 61 year-old Mr Blum is preparing a last gasp fight in the High Court to prevent the council from putting Christopher to rest some time next month.

'When people hear that Christopher is unburied they think I am some sort of nutter, a crazy person, who just can't let go,' said Mr Blum who lives in a two bedroomed flat in Bush Hill Park, North London.

'The key point about my son's death is that you cannot have cot death if a cause of death is found.

'Cot death is an unexplained death, meaning nothing untoward can be found for a healthy baby suddenly and unexpectedly dying.

'In Christopher's case there was a cause. And that's why I refuse to accept he was a victim of cot death. There should have been an inquest into his death.'

Do they really think I want Christopher lying there officially undead?” Mr Blum said.

A spokesman for Enfield Council said: 'Despite Mr Blum's wishes we believe we have the legal right to bury Christopher and we are now making plans for that to happen.

'We are trying to get Mr Blum's co-operation. This is a sensitive matter. We have obtained the consent of the Registrar General and believe what we are doing is legal.'

* The longest unburied body in the UK is that of nurse Helen Smith who was 23 when she fell off a balcony in Saudi Arabia in 1979.She remains in a mortuary in Leeds.
Her 81 year-old father, Ron, refuses to have her buried until it is accepted she is a victim of murder. Mr Smith said he had an undertaking from the local council in Leeds that his daughter would remain in the mortuary whilst her death was still being contested. "There is no pressure from anyone for me to bury Helen," he said.

From thisislondon.co.uk, from the Evening Standard, 28 July 2008

VAN UK'S Comment: SIDS cannot be a 'cause' of death, as SIDS is unexplained, therefore when they say SIDS they are saying they don't know the cause - which may well have been vaccination, especially with the presence of blood infection