This is shocking.
A father in New York caused chaos in the hospital his wife was attending for her pregnancy, when he hid coronavirus symptoms to attend the birth of his child.
Staff at University of Rochester’s Strong Memorial Hospital were horrified when they found out as this could have led to widespread transmission of the infection.
Many hospitals, including those in Ireland, have begun asking women not to have birth partners. While this was understandably met with some backlash, situations like this unfortunately prove what staff were afraid would happen.
It can be dangerous for newborns to be exposed to the regular flu, so potentially exposing an entire maternity ward to COVID-19 is just downright reckless.
Staff only found out that the father had symptoms after the mother he was visiting also started to display symptoms.
As of yet, none of the staff members who made contact with the man have tested positive and the family in question have been put into quarantine.
The hospital has now implemented mandatory temperature checks for all visitors at the door.
The University of Rochester’s Strong Memorial Hospital made an official statement, detailing what happened and how they hope to prevent it from happening again.
The statement said:
“The patient in question and her partner were in a private maternity room throughout their hospital stay. Both the mother and partner were isolated from other patients. After the mother exhibited symptoms, and the OB team learned that the partner had been exposed to COVID-19 and was symptomatic, the patient was tested and all staff who had been in contact were informed of their possible exposure. Per hospital protocols, staff members without symptoms continued to work while masked, monitoring for symptoms of COVID-19, and having their temperatures checked twice daily.
“No involved staff members have tested positive for COVID-19. One staff member developed symptoms, was quarantined at home, and later tested negative for COVID-19. The couple and their baby were asked to quarantine, pending testing results, to protect the community and were discharged from the hospital”
It continued:
“The families and patients of the upstate NY region should be assured that the safety of our patients and their families, as well as our staff, are our top priority during this crisis. Our healthcare team understands how important it is to pregnant patients to have a support person with them during labor, and therefore, additional safeguards have been added allow this to continue safely. We will continue to weigh all the medical evidence available to continue to make the best possible decision for all our patients, visitors, and staff.”
