Man told to leave UK after wife dies in drugs mix-up

A FILIPINO man is being deported from Britain because his wife, who died after a hospital blunder, is no longer working here, an inquest jury heard yesterday.

Arnel Cabrera's wife, Mayra, 30, died after an epidural anaesthetic was wrongly injected into her arm during childbirth rather than into the space of her spinal cord.

She died at Great Western Hospital, Swindon, Wiltshire, in May 2004. Swindon and Marlborough NHS Trust has since admitted liability for administering Bupivacaine, a potent anaesthetic, intravenously rather than epidurally.

Mrs Cabrera had been working as a theatre nurse at the hospital, where she died shortly after giving birth to son Zac.

She came to the UK from the Philippines in 2002, settling in Swindon with Mr Cabrera, 38, who was permitted to stay in Britain on the basis that she was working.

Mr Cabrera has since been informed that, because she is no longer working, he must leave the country as soon as her inquest has concluded.

The inquest continues.