A bungling doctor mistakenly performed an abortion on the wrong pregnant woman at a clinic, it has emerged.
The patient was in a clinic in South Korea for a routine appointment, but instead awoke still under anaesthetic to find she was no longer pregnant.
Authorities say the woman, who was six weeks pregnant, was supposed to be having a nutritional shot at the treatment centre.
However a mix-up over her medical charts and failure to check her identity led to her having the termination, reports CNN .
The doctor and nurse in charge have acknowledged their fault and now face an accusation off negligence resulting in bodily harm, a Gangseo Police official told media.
The nurse is alleged to have injected the woman with anaesthesia without checking her identity, and the doctor had performed the abortion without checking either.
Police reportedly announced the investigation on Monday and will be referring the case to the prosecutor's office.
This April South Korea's courts overturned a 65-year ban on abortion.
The landmark ruling said the law banning terminations curbed women's rights and was unconstitutional.
The country's top court also found the law making doctors liable for criminal charges if they performed abortions was unconstitutional.
However the reversal of the restrictive laws are not due to take effect until lawmakers revise them, which they must do by the end of December 2020.
Under existing laws in the country, abortion remains illegal and is punishable by up to a year in prison.
Exceptions are made for cases of pregnancy due to rape or incest, where parents have hereditary diseases, or where the pregnancy is threatening the life of the mother.
However abortion remains under-reported the laws remain largely unenforced, with an estimated 50,000 terminations carried out in South Korea last year according to official statistics.
A survey earlier this year showed almost two-thirds of South Koreans wanted the anti-abortion laws scrapped.
Reuters reported that just eight cases of illegal abortion were prosecuted in 2017, down from 24 in 2016, and the judgements rarely included punishment.
