ILOILO CITY — With no available services at the nearest hospital, a mother infected with COVID-19 gave birth at an isolation facility in Concepcion town, Iloilo province.
Concepcion Mayor Raul Banias said that nurses and other staff of the local government’s isolation facility helped the 22-year-old mother deliver a baby boy last Sunday, September 26.
“Our alert and capable nurses and other staff were ready for this situation. Quickly donning full PPEs, they readied themselves to this auspicious event guided over the phone by our municipal health officer and aided by midwives,” said Banias.
“Not shirking from a medical emergency, they hastily prepared a makeshift delivery table from a bamboo cot we provided in each isolation room,” added Banias.
The woman tested positive for COVID-19 in a routine testing for expectant mothers in their third trimester of pregnancy. As per protocol, the woman was taken into the local government’s designated isolation facility.
When she went into labor last Sunday, she was supposed to be taken to the provincial government’s district hospital in the neighboring town of Sara. But Sara District Hospital could not accommodate the mother in giving birth to her second child.
“Many of the hospital’s staff are isolated and quarantined because of COVID-19,” explained Banias, a medical doctor himself.