"...the tiniest corner..."

If you have time you should read this story. Told by a student on the birth attendant school a couple of years ago while she was on outreach working at a government hospital in Hyderabad, India.


On the 6th I was at the hospital walking by myself back to the wards from lunch when I heard a crying baby (not unusual at a maternity hospital but this was outside and there was only one other woman around who did not have a baby with her). The woman who was walking by pointed around a corner.. and behind a low wall I found a little baby boy lying on the ground, dirty, severely malnourished and crying. Obviously abandoned he was clothed and had blankets with him. I picked him up and took him to the labour room (the closest ward) and explained to the madams (doctors) that I had found him. I weighed him and gave him a bath and took him to the nursery with one of the hospital staff. I went back to where I found him to try and see whether there was anything else that would indicate who he was – all I found was baby’s bottle full of milk, still warm. After going around the hospital for quite some time holding this wee baby in my arms getting signatures and approvals from all the appropriate people he was admitted to the nursery – the case sheet said ‘unknown male baby, 1.9kg.’ the pediatrician said that it would be very difficult to estimate his age due to the severe malnutrition but I think he would have been at least 2 weeks to a month old. He had a great lot of thick spikey black hair and the most beautiful long eyelashes I have ever seen on a baby. In my heart I named him Lucas and prayed acceptance, love and life over him. He got IV antibiotics and fluids and the hours that I was at the hospital I would go up to the nursery every 3 hours and feed him from a bottle, his big eyes looking up at me. he only lived two more days before dying… in his final hours he was warm and fed. Over this time God gave me a picture of the desperation and heartache a family must have felt to abandon him, satan’s attack in the form of the attitude of the nursery staff not thinking he was worth looking after and God’s presence with him as he died – 30 other babies surrounding him with their cries of life. In reality it is just the tiniest corner in the big picture of poverty, desperation and injustice that we see every day at this hospital and in this city.
--Paula Dixon