The mother of the baby, wrongly diagnosed with colic by a Croydon NHS telephonist, has this week spoken of her anger at the blunder which cost her daughter's life.

Cherry Chapple lost one of her twin daughters, Jordan Billing, to the deadly brain bug meningitis after a Mayday-based NHS Direct nurse dismissed her child's symptoms as a stomach complaint.

As reported in the Croydon Guardian last week, nurse Joanne Abel had created a "false sense of security" when she advised Miss Chapple to give her daughter colic drops.

The advice meant that premature baby Jordan Billings, aged four weeks, waited 12 hours to be seen by a doctor when a quick response may have saved her life.

The February 13 inquest into little Jordan's death at Southwark Crown Court recorded a verdict of death by natural causes.

Miss Chapple said: "I feel very angry. This should not have been allowed to happen. NHS Direct are apparently there to assess and advise, but as the coroner said, they gave me a diagnosis and giving the wrong diagnosis is worse than none at all.

"I am now more worried about the safety of Charlie (Jordan's twin sister). A couple of weeks after Jordan died she was up screaming and I rushed her straight to the hospital. She actually had colic.

"Hopefully this won't happen to anybody else. Nobody should have to go through what we have."