Hospital where activists say ICE detainees were subjected to hysterectomies says just two were performed there

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A hospital in rural Georgia where a physician has been accused of performing a large number of hysterectomies on immigrant detainees said its records show that just two women in immigration custody were referred to the hospital for the procedure since 2017.

Heath Clark, an attorney for ERH Healthcare, which operates the Irwin County Hospital, said both of the procedures were performed by Mahendra Amin, the physician who activists have accused of carrying out forced sterilizations on immigrant women in U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement custody.

According to a complaint filed last week by immigrant advocates and attorneys, a former nurse who worked at the Irwin County Detention Center, Dawn Wooten, claimed a doctor known as “the uterus collector” was subjecting female ICE detainees to unwanted hysterectomies. The doctor was later identified in news reports as Amin. Through attorneys, he has denied the accusations, and calls to his office were not answered Tuesday.

Clark said hospital records show Wooten’s claims are “demonstrably false.”

“These allegations are disturbing and sensational, but they are not supported by reality,” said Clark, speaking by phone from Nashville, Tenn. “Dr. Amin is a longtime member of the Irwin County Hospital medical staff and has been in good standing for the entirety of his service to the Irwin County community.”

The explosive allegations of forced sterilizations received significant attention from lawmakers, news organizations and rights groups last week. Attorneys who represent several women have come forward to say their clients received gynecological treatments from Amin that they did not agree to or fully understand, including one former Irwin detainee, Pauline Binam, who said one of her fallopian tubes was removed without consent.

Binam’s deportation to Cameroon was halted last week at the behest of Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas.

Amin has a private clinic near the detention facility, but the hospital is the only place where such a procedure would be performed in tiny Irwin County, which has a population of 10,000, Clark said. Amin does not have an ownership stake in the hospital, contrary to some news reports, Clark said.

The Department of Homeland Security has initiated its own investigation into the accusations from Irwin. On Monday, Democratic lawmakers from the House Homeland Security committee released a report alleging inadequate medical care at numerous facilities, but the Irwin detention center was not one of the sites the committee inspected.

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-N.J., one of the lawmakers who participated in a virtual hearing Monday to discuss the ICE report, called Wooten’s allegations of sterilization procedures on ICE detainees “one of the most inhumane things I have ever heard.”

Another Democrat, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., wrote a letter last week signed by 173 lawmakers demanding a DHS inspector general investigation.

“It appears that there may be at minimum 17 to 18 women who were subjected to unnecessary medical gynecological procedures from just this one doctor, often without appropriate consent or knowledge, and with the clear intention of sterilization,” Jayapal said.

In a subsequent interview, Jayapal acknowledged she did not know the details of each of those cases, but the number she cited referred to the clients of attorneys with whom she spoke.

The advocacy group that filed the complaint, Project South, did not make the hysterectomy allegations the focus of its Sept. 14 complaint to DHS, a complaint that alleged there is poor medical care and covid risks at the ICE facility. But it was the charges of forced sterilizations that immediately triggered a firestorm.

“The rate at which the hysterectomies have occurred have been a red flag for Ms. Wooten and other nurses at ICDC,” the Project South complaint stated, without identifying other nurses.

“Ms. Wooten explained: We’ve questioned among ourselves like goodness he’s taking everybody’s stuff out . . . That’s his specialty, he’s the uterus collector. I know that’s ugly . . . is he collecting these things or something . . . Everybody he sees, he’s taking all their uteruses out or he’s taken their tubes out.”

Priyanka Bhatt, the attorney at Project South who was the lead investigator for the complaint, said in an interview with The Post that she did not speak to or identify any women who had undergone a hysterectomy. Bhatt said she included the allegations to spark an investigation into their validity.

The legal director at Project South, Azadeh Shahshahani, did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.

ICE said its records show two female detainees at Irwin have been referred for hysterectomies since 2018. Officials at ICE said the agency would have records of such procedures, which would require the approval of a supervising medical officer at the agency. ICE officials say they are cooperating with investigators from DHS and the inspector general’s office.