BABY ALEX DIES

THE TEENAGED mother of the triplets was devastated and traumatised yesterday following the death on Wednesday night of Baby Alex, the only boy of the three born to her at the San Fernando Hospital on Wednesday of last week.

The baby boy died around 7 pm at the hospital hours after he and his two sisters were removed from the incubator in the nursery. His death came as a shock to Aarita Hosein, 17, and her husband Ravi, 25, who were told by doctors that their babies, even though they were born three weeks premature, were healthy. Communications Specialist of the South West Regional Health Authority, Zanobia Nanan, said yesterday that a post mortem on the baby revealed that death was due to prematurity and bleeding in the lungs. Nanan said one of the baby girls is being treated for jaundice. But both babies, Ariel and Aliyah, are said to be doing well and are stable. The birth of the triplets last Wednesday was described as a “miracle from God” by Ravi, since the couple had no idea that Aarita was pregnant with three babies. It was only discovered that she was having triplets when she gave birth to the first baby and an ultrasound revealed that there were two other babies. The triplets each weighed 1.3 kilogrammes.

Newsday learnt that the baby boy was the last to be delivered and apparently was the weakest in the set. When contacted yesterday, the babies’ father, Ravi, said his wife was shocked at the death of their baby boy. “My wife is crying all the time,” he said. “She is really upset.”  He said that the babies were taken out of the incubator around 9 am on Wednesday and were said to be doing fine. “Around midday,” he said, “the baby boy started having difficulty in breathing and was put back into the incubator.”  He said the nurses told him that the baby was bleeding in his lungs. Ravi said his wife was allowed to go home as doctors felt she may not have been able to handle seeing her baby in that condition. “About a half an hour after we arrived home, around 7 pm, they called and said that the baby died,” he said. “I do not understand what happened because the babies were healthy when they were born. I feel maybe they took him out of the incubator too soon.” He said he did not know why the hospital did not know the baby was bleeding in his lungs. Too distraught to speak with the reporters yesterday at the hospital, a crying Aarita sat on the bench outside the maternity ward weeping on her husband’s shoulders.

Aarita’s mother, Pamela Mohammed, who was at the hospital when the baby died, said she received a phone call from the hospital saying that one of the babies needed blood.  When she arrived at the hospital, Mohammed said, the nurses told her that “everything was okay and the baby just needed some blood”. She said they told her that a supply of blood was being sent from Port-of-Spain. On the verge of crying, Mohammed said while her daughter had not yet decided on a name for the baby boy, he was being called Alex. “I liked Amir but they wanted a more Christian name like Alex,” she said.

A senior doctor told Newsday yesterday that sometimes premature babies appear healthy when they are born but many eventually develop complications and infections during the course of their development. He said the risks are greater with twins and triplets and the first week after their births is considered a critical time. Head of Obstetrics and Gyneacolgy Jehan Ali told Newsday yesterday that the death was unfortunate but it underscores the need for a neo-natal unit in the hospital for which he has been lobbying for the past five years. “Fifty percent of baby deaths occur up to one week after birth due to lack of proper neo-natal facilities,” he lamented.