The New York Daily News is reporting that during the blizzard that covered much of the city, a baby delivered inside a Brooklyn building died after the emergency call for the birth brought no help for nine hours.
According to Daily News reporters, the newborn was pronounced dead on Monday night, 10 hours after the first call from the lobby of the Crown Heights apartment. The mother is reportedly recovering at Interfaith Medical Center. The grandmother states that her Crown Heights neighborhood was not plowed, and hours went by before help arrived. Once firefighters and police officers managed to make it to the apartment, the baby was unconcious and unresponsive.
The infant death is one of many incidents depicting a city struggling to deal with the holiday winter weather.
Queens: According to state Senator Jose Peralta’s office, a woman dies after waiting over three hours once a 911 call is finally answered.
Brooklyn: A woman ended up spending the night with her dead father due to the medical examinier taking more than 24 hours to claim his body.
Brooklyn: Good samaritans fashioned a cot into a sled and helped carry an elderly heart attack victim after the FDNY ambulance transporting him became stuck in a snowbank.
The Daily News states that none of these difficulties overshadows the death of the infant in Brooklyn. The pregnant woman, who had kept details of the impending birth from her family, was walking home whe she went into an apartmenr building lobby, unable to no further.
According to an FDNY source, a 911 call was made at 8:30 a.m. with the caller saying the birth wasn’t imminent. The call received a low priority, and dispatchers unsuccessfully tried twice to contact the calling party over the next few hours. A second call, more urgent, was received at 4:30 p.m. reporting the woman was bleeding and birth was imminent. The call was then upgraded.
One hour later, the NYPD contacted the FDNY/EMS reporting that the baby had been delivered but was unconscious. Police officers cut the umbilical cord and tried to resuscitate the baby. This upgraded the call was then upgraded to the highest priority, and sources reported that an FDNY EMS crew arrived within 12 minutes, at 6:00 p.m.
The city medical examiner is expected to do an autopsy on the baby.
