A premature baby from Florida has gone home from hospital for the first time after spending over a year in neonatal intensive care.
Baby Shiloh was born at 29 weeks gestation and weighed just over three pounds at birth. He experienced multiple health problems including chronic lung injury and a hole in his heart, and transferred hospitals shortly after birth to get the specialist help he needed. He has since undergone extensive health procedures including heart surgery and a tracheotomy.
A few months ago, Shiloh celebrated his first birthday in hospital with his parents and hospital staff.
“It has been a journey being here this long, but because of the care here with the staff, the nurses and the doctors, they have given us a peace of mind”, said his mother Lomiekia. “It has been hard, and this journey has been a test of time because this is something new to us. We have never known anything about babies with trachs, and we are learning something daily”.
Now however, after 340 days in intensive care, Shiloh was able to go home for the first time, with medical staff cheering him on as he left the hospital.
Medical developments have led to an increased understanding of life before birth
At 12 weeks gestation (the most common abortion time limit among countries in the EU), the NHS outlines that the unborn baby is fully formed. All the organs, muscles, limbs and bones are in place, and the sex organs are well developed. From then on, the baby just has to grow and mature.
At around 15 weeks gestation, the unborn baby will start to hear – they may hear muted sounds from the outside world, as well as the sound of their mother’s voice and heart. At 16 weeks gestation, the muscles of the unborn baby’s face can now move and the beginnings of facial expressions appear.
At 18 weeks gestation, the unborn baby may respond to loud noises from the outside world, such as music. At 22 weeks gestation, the unborn baby is beginning to get into a pattern of sleeping and waking. At 23 weeks gestation, the unborn baby’s lungs are practising breathing movements to prepare for life outside the womb.
It is legal to abort a baby at any of the above stages of development, right through to 24 weeks gestation, under the current conditions set out in section 1(1)(a) of the Abortion Act.
Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said “We are delighted to hear that baby Shiloh has been able to return home after such a long battle in hospital. It is a testament to the brilliance of the medical staff and scientific advances of recent decades that premature babies like Shiloh are able to survive to return home. These same scientific advances are now demonstrating clear evidence that babies in the womb are fully formed from a very young age and therefore our attitudes towards preborn babies need to change”.
