Miracle birth: ‘My newborns died due to shortage of facilities’

Two out of four boys die a few hours after being born

FAISALABAD:

The family of a woman, who gave birth to quadruplets on Tuesday night, protested outside a hospital in Jaranwala on Wednesday, alleging that shortage of facilities had resulted in the death of two of the babies.

The protesters gathered outside the hospital, chanted slogans against the administration and urged the chief minister to take notice of the situation.

Talking to The Express Tribune Rashid Ali, one of the protesters, said 28-year-old Zainab Bibi, a resident of Chak 239-GB, had been brought to Punjab Hospital in Jaranwala at Gollar Mor on Tuesday when she went into labour.

He said she gave birth to four boys.

“A few hours after the birth, two of them seemed to have respiratory problems,” he said. “We asked the staff on duty to take care of them but they told us that there the hospital did not have adequate facilities needed for their treatment,” he said.

He said the babies died a few hours later.

A large number of people had gathered outside the hospital to catch a glimpse of the four newborns.

When they were told that two of them had died, they began protesting.

Muhammad Rizwan, 30, father of the newborns, told The Express Tribune that he had four children. “I am a daily wage worker. I want to move court against the hospital administration but I do not have the means to do so.”

He said his children had died because of shortage of essential supplies.

“Having four sons is a miracle,” he said. “I was still absorbing this when I heard that two of them had died.”

He appealed to the chief minister and the health secretary to take notice of the situation

Dr Muhammad Irfan, head of the hospital, told The Express Tribune that the woman and the quadruplets had been healthy at the time of delivery.

“We were doing our best for them,” he said. “A few hours later, two of them developed breathing problems and died.”

He said doctors had concluded that their organs had not fully developed at the time of birth.

“The mother and the other children are in a stable condition,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 7^th, 2015.