Whether or not a settlement has been struck between one or both parents of a baby whose lips were taped shut to stop its crying by staff at the Cebu Puericulture Center and Maternity House, on the one hand, and the said hospital, on the other, such settlement should only extinguish any action by one against the other.
What the supposed settlement cannot do is prevent the government, or any of the appropriate agencies that looked into the matter, from slapping sanctions against the hospital, as well as the responsible members of the staff implicated in the case.
Indeed, that is precisely the recommendation made by a committee of several government agencies that looked into the incident. The committee's findings listed several lapses and violations committed by the hospital and its staff in handling patients under their care.
The incident involving the baby was not the only one reported. After the news broke out, and after the hospital first tried to be evasive, several more alleged victims surfaced with the same claim, that crying babies were made to shut up by taping their lips shut.
It does not take a medical practitioner or health care expert to know that this is a procedure that has no place in a professional setting such as a hospital. Even ordinary folk have not been heard to resort to such an insensitive and uncaring practice as taping a baby's mouth shut.
Babies do what babies normally do - they cry. And they cannot help it. Anyone who cannot see that must be suffering from something terrible. That is why rules and regulations concerning the care of babies clearly must have been drafted with patience and understanding for babies taken into consideration.
Anyone or anything that violates the inviolability of patience and understanding toward babies should not be made to escape responsibility and culpability. They must be made to answer for actions done against the helpless.
If the victims in their private capacities choose to settle, it should not follow that institutional remedies get extinguished as well. The government itself, acting on behalf of all citizens for their interest, must initiate action to recover responsibility where responsibility is clearly due.