Kolkata: Nurse breastfeeds baby after mom can't

KOLKATA: A young nurse at a city hospital demonstrated a new meaning for the phrase “the milk of human kindness” when she nursed a newborn with her own breast milk after the baby’s mother could not.

Uma Adhikary (her name is being published with her consent) — herself a new mother, on night duty at the labour post-operative ward (LPOW) of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital on Thursday — says she couldn’t bear to see the few-hours-old newborn crying out for milk.

The baby’s mother, who had undergone a C-section, could not feed her herself as she was yet to start lactating.

There were approximately eight more mothers who had just given birth at the ward. The general practice, when a mother cannot start feeding her baby, is that the other mothers pitch in. But, due to Covid-19 fears, no one was ready to step forward this time.

“It was a hectic night, and the baby was crying out of hunger,” says Uma. “I could not keep myself away from the child. So, I decided to breastfeed her myself.”

The other new mothers’ fears were not without reason. All major hospitals have had their share of Covid-19 scares, with pregnant women testing positive, including at RG Kar Hospital, that has had at least three such cases. There have been 30-odd cases of pregnant women testing positive across Medical College Hospital, NRS medical College and Hospital, KPC Medical College and Hospital, Chittaranjan Seva Sadan and a few private hospitals in the city.

Just when Uma started feeding the newborn, her husband, Shantanu Maity, called her up as their eight-month-old would not go to sleep without seeing her mother on video call. But Uma did not take the call and texted him back, saying she was breastfeeding a baby. “Shantanu was a bit worried, as I would be breastfeeding our son the next morning,” Uma says. “But I assured him that I was following all hygiene protocol.” In fact, she even took a selfie to prove her point.

Doctors at the hospital said that none of the women who are allowed to deliver babies in the main OT show any symptoms, and are all from non-containment zones. The mother of this baby, too, had undergone the C-section in the main OT. While the women themselves are not tested for Covid-19 as they do not show symptoms, doctors and nurses take all precautions to minimise risk, said hospital sources.

Tulika Jha, associate professor of gynaecology and obstetrics at the hospital, says while wet-nursing is not uncommon, she has never seen an on-duty nurse do it. “Kudos to the young nurse, whose maternal instinct came to the hungry newborn’s rescue,” she says.

Doctors said that even if a mother, or the newborn, or both were Covid-19-positive, the baby could be breastfed after taking all hygienic precautions, like wearing a mask.

Uma, who is a reserved nurse, was posted in a different ward from the next night. Since the LOPW is a place to temporarily keep mothers under observation for a short period, the baby’s mother, too, has been shifted to another ward.

Ironically, Uma was one of the dedicated healthcare professionals who had to undergo harassment from locals at the beginning of the pandemic, as they objected to her daily commute to and from the hospital from her house in Tetulata, in Lake Town. The nurse, who had been on maternity leave, had gone back to work days before the pandemic reached India. Even as she had the option of staying on the hospital premises, she had a son, who she wanted to breastfeed. She, thus, had to seek the help of the local police station and produced a doctor’s certificate.

“Apart from me, my elderly mother, husband and my son had to undergo thermal screening to prove to the locals that none of us had symptoms,” Uma recounts.

The photo of Uma nursing the baby has been shared by some RG Kar doctors. “Despite harassment of healthcare workers from some sections of the society, what this nurse has done is laudable. This was not part of her duty,” sayd Kingshuk Karmakar of the West Bengal Medical Students Cell.