Photo: Mentally challenged woman gives birth to baby girl on a street in Calabar

A mentally ill woman in her thirties delivered a baby girl on Ndidem Usang Iso, Marian road, Calabar’s most highbrow street, yesterday, June 9 at about 3:50pm. According to CrossRiverWatch, eyewitnesses around said the lady has been a familiar face in the neighbourhood before she became pregnant.

 

When a CrossRiverWatch reporter visited the scene of the delivery after the mother and baby had been moved to the hospital, one shop owner told our reporter that:

"We did not see her again for some time after she became pregnant. I think she was raped. She returned some days ago and sat in that place and has been feeling very uncomfortable since yesterday. Nobody knew it was labor that was disturbing her. It was when the baby started coming out that people called the health workers who came here to assist her."

The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Inyang Asibong, responded immediately by going to the scene personally with an ambulance to handle the situation. On arrival, she took the mother and the baby to the General Hospital, Calabar for expert medical attention.

Dr. Asibong also promised that after their discharge from the hospital, the mother and child will be referred to a psychiatric hospital.

The mentally ill lady refused to go to the hospital. She later agreed after a friend of hers, another mentally ill woman, came and begged her.

Source: CrossRiverWatch