DM Monitoring
BAMAKO: A Malian woman has given birth to nine babies, joining a small group of mothers of nonuplets, according to Mali’s government.
The pregnancy of Halima Cisse, 25, fascinated the country and attracted the attention of its leaders. When doctors in March said Cisse needed specialist care, authorities flew her to Morocco, where on Tuesday she gave birth to five girls and four boys by caesarean section.
“The newborns (five girls and four boys) and the mother are all doing well,” Mali’s health minister Fanta Siby said in a statement, adding they are due to return home in several weeks’ time.
Siby offered her congratulations to “the medical teams of Mali and Morocco, whose professionalism is at the origin of the happy outcome of this pregnancy”.
Cisse was expected to give birth to septuplets (seven babies), according to ultrasounds conducted in Morocco and Mali that missed two of the babies. Cases of women successfully carrying septuplets to term are rare – and nonuplets even rarer.
Moroccan authorities have yet to confirm what would be an extremely rare case. Health ministry spokesman Rachid Koudhari said he had no knowledge of such a multiple birth having taken place in one of the country’s hospitals, according to international media reports.
