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In southern Gaza, in Deir el-Balah, a young woman gave birth to four premature newborns. Although they are all alive, some are seriously lacking in care.
It was an exceptional birth which took place on December 18. Amid the bombings, a young Palestinian woman gave birth to four newborns, one weighing barely a kilo.
The young mother gave birth by cesarean section
Iman Al-Masry experienced the unthinkable: it was in the middle of the war that she gave birth to her quadruplets.
The young mother had already had to flee the fighting between Hamas and Israel, leaving her home to reach the south of the Gaza Strip.
“I only took a few summer clothes with me for my children“, she revealed to AFP. “I thought the war wouldn’t last more than a week or two and we’d go home.”
Except that in reality, the war continued… and worsened his health.
“The distance tired me and affected my pregnancy. I went to the doctor who told me I had signs of premature labor. They gave me injections to stabilize the pregnancy“, she explains to AFP.
Result ? At only eight months pregnant, the young woman was induced. She then gave birth to quadruplets, by cesarean section, in Deir el-Balah.
The fourth baby is under medical supervision
While three of the newborns – Yasser, Tia and Lynn – live with her, in a classroom in a school in Deir el-Balah, the youngest, Mohammad, is under medical supervision in a hospital in the camp. Nesseirat.
“The fourth baby’s health was unstable. It only weighs one kilo. He may not survive,” reveals the young mother, who has not seen Mohammad since his birth. “I worry about him, but the road is dangerous“, to go visit him.
A family friend is watching him.
Significant nutritional deficiencies
The other children are not, however, protected from the misdeeds of war, since the family is struggling to get back on its feet.
Tia, one of the premature babies, suffers from jaundice, but her mother cannot breastfeed her properly.
“She needs to be breastfed to reduce illness and my wife needs to eat foods that contain protein, but I can’t provide that for her. My children need milk and diapers“, confides the father of the family.
As a reminder, if a small proportion of breastfed children (15%) develop jaundice linked to breastfeeding – which disappears without special care – in very rare cases, the bilirubin level increases to the point of causing brain damage.