A 19-year-old woman gave birth to a baby in a toilet bowl at a fast food outlet in Sangre Grande during J'Ouvert celebrations on Carnival Monday. The baby boy fell into the bowl straight from the mother's womb but was taken out alive in time by a worker. KFC worker, Alicia Espinoza, who heroically assisted Shawna Nagasser, said the baby boy and his mom were now "doing well" at the Sangre Grande Hospital where they are warded.
Espinoza, also of Sangre Grande, who said she cried for 45 minutes after the incident, recalled the chain of events. She said it was around 7 am Monday morning when they saw Nagasser, a dark-skinned dougla woman, with her head down on a table in KFC sleeping. "We thought she was drunk and left her alone. But when three hours passed and she still did not get up the manager asked me to go and see what was going on with her.
"She told me she was hungry and her belly was hurting and she wanted to use the washroom. "I brought something for her to eat but she said she really needed to use the washroom." Espinoza said after a while the manager again told her to go and check on the woman whom they had noticed was pregnant. She said Nagasser was sitting on the toilet seat when she went into the washroom and she asked her how far advanced into her pregnancy she was.
"She said she was about four or five months pregnant. Then she said, "you know I see the baby foot touch my leg". She was trembling." Espinoza, a trained nurse's assistant, said she asked Nagasser if she took anything to "throw away" the baby and she replied no. "She said she only took two Boscopan pain relievers." Espinoza said she went and got a pair of gloves and returned to the washroom. "I placed a chair near her and told her to ease herself off the toilet seat onto it so I could see what was in the bowl.
"I saw a white mass and thought it was a foetus in the sac." Putting her gloved hands in the bowl, Espinoza felt the baby's legs and holding them together pulled him out. "He was a full term baby. I felt him take a breath and I said "you all the baby is alive, let's move quickly to get him to safety."" Espinoza said there was nothing to cut the umbilical cord with and they placed the young mother on a trolley. "I heard the baby crying and took a clean cloth and wiped the water from his face and mouth and head."
She said KFC management had called the EHS ambulance service but was told there was no ambulance available. "I told them to go outside and see if any police officers were on patrol. "The officers came and they called the Fire Service and they took mother and child to the Sangre Grande Hospital," she recalled.
Keila Joseph, another KFC worker who also assisted Nagasser, said the young woman lived with a guardian on Compton Street, Sangre Grande, and attended the Salvation Army church in the area. She said Nagasser's guardian died last year.