Pedestrians stood in shock at Curepe junction during the pre-dawn hours of yesterday as a 34-year-old woman was seen lying on the pavement near the Chaguanas taxi stand giving birth.
Three women and a police officer, identified as PC Palmer, assigned to the Guard and Emergency Branch, ran to the woman’s assistance. She gave birth to a girl, who weighed seven pounds.
Speaking with the T&T Guardian, one of the good Samaritans, identified as Omega Peru, of Arima, said at about 4.20 am she was passing through Curepe junction when she was alerted by a woman dressed in a Cepep uniform that a woman was in labour and that the baby’s head was already “popping out.”
“The woman was screaming at the top of her voice. When I looked across to the taxi stand I saw the woman there lying on the pavement. All the taxi drivers and people going to work or going wherever were just standing there looking. Nobody was going to help the woman. Maybe they were too shocked, I don’t know, but myself and my two other friends went to help her,” Peru said.
“I was there comforting the mother telling her that don’t worry, everything will be all right and her baby will be OK. I was telling her that I am here with her through it all and she will get through this. My friend Isha kept at the baby, making sure the baby was all right until the ambulance came,” Peru said.
When the T&T Guardian visited the area yesterday, almost every vendor, taxi and maxi taxi driver and operator either passing through the junction or stationed there knew of the “pavement birth,” as many described it.
Peru’s friend Isha was the one who actually assisted with the delivery of the baby. “She was the one who helped the baby out. I videotaped the entire thing and then when the baby was born I stopped videotaping and went and got a towel and wrapped up the baby and put her on top of her mother. The umbilical cord was still attached. The ambulance came a few minutes later and took both mother and baby to the hospital.”
Peru’s video was posted on Facebook and it immediately went viral on social media. By 5.20 pm it had over 29,000 views and thousands of comments by concerned people on social media.
At the Women’s Hospital in Mt Hope, the T&T Guardian was told by hospital officials it was the mother’s fourth baby.
A hospital official, who wished not to be identified, said the child’s father, who gave his address as Bangladesh in St Joseph, visited the woman and child yesterday.
Medical Chief of Staff at the Women’s Hospital in Mount Hope Dr Karen Sohan yesterday confirmed that both mother and baby were warded at the hospital and were “doing well.”