The prosecution said test results that showed low blood sugar and “abnormally high” insulin levels, with very low levels of C-peptide, meant it “must be that they have been given or taken” synthetic insulin that had not been prescribed.
However, a new 100-page report by Chase, a distinguished professor of bioengineering at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, and the British chemical engineering expert Helen Shannon, says low blood sugar levels are “not uncommon” in pre-term infants.
The study adds that insulin poisoning would probably have resulted in far lower levels of potassium and glucose than the babies’ records show, and points out that they showed no symptoms of severe insulin poisoning, such as seizures or heart arrhythmia.
The report, which references more than 250 peer-reviewed scientific papers and is due to be sent to the CCRC within weeks, describes the immunoassay test used in this case – and relied on by the Crown Prosecution Service – as “not reliable” and “not of forensic quality”.