KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Christ­mas Day brought added joy to many fam­i­lies as a to­tal of sev­en ba­bies were born as of press time yes­ter­day.

The East­ern Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (EHRA) record­ed two births at the San­gre Grande Hos­pi­tal Cam­pus.

The South-West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (SWRHA) al­so record­ed two births at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

The North-West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty (NWRHA) record­ed three births at the Port-of-Spain Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal.

ER­HA deputy chair­man Dr Stephan Bha­gan and ER­HA chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer (CEO) An­geli­na Ram­per­sad-Pierre joined the moth­ers in wel­com­ing their new­borns on the fes­tive hol­i­day.

Ac­cord­ing to the ER­HA, Onel­la Gill was the first moth­er to give birth at the fa­cil­i­ty on Christ­mas Day.

She de­liv­ered a ba­by boy weigh­ing 2,365 grams.

The de­liv­ery was con­duct­ed by mid­wife Marel­la Mark.

To mark the spe­cial oc­ca­sion, Bha­gan and Ram­per­sad-Pierre pre­sent­ed Gill with a ham­per filled with ba­by prod­ucts.

In keep­ing with the giv­ing spir­it of the sea­son, all oth­er moth­ers on the ma­ter­ni­ty ward, as well as ex­pec­tant moth­ers await­ing de­liv­ery, al­so re­ceived gift bags con­tain­ing per­son­al items for both moth­er and ba­by.

At SWRHA, Kim­ber­ly Singh and Yal­iz­mar Moreno Mats each gave birth to a ba­by girl at 3.45 am and 4 am re­spec­tive­ly.

And at NWRHA, 22-year-old Janiel Garib gave birth to a boy at 12.01 am, 31-year-old Khadi­jah Bib­by gave birth to a girl at 10.54 am, and 24-year-old Ariel Be­tan­court gave birth to a girl at 1.16 pm.

No births were record­ed in To­ba­go up to press time.