Four Times The Pain

The birth of their four miracle babies was supposed to be a celebration, but this family’s joy quickly turned into tragedy – now they want answers.

- Aphiwe Boyce

IT WAS a shock to find out she was expecting four babies. She and her partner already had three children and hadn’t planned to have even one more child – let alone quadruplets.

But as the shock wore off they started to get excited and even chose names for their new brood.

Yet now, instead of celebrating the joy of new life they’re mourning the deaths of all four babies, who passed away before their mom even had a proper chance to cuddle them.

Khumbuzile Xaba (37) and her partner, Enos Bila (47), want answers from Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital (Bara) in Soweto where the babies were born. They were under the impression the babies were healthy – then came the devastating news that none of them had made it.

Now the parents are considering suing the hospital for negligence – although the department of health insists the couple was cautioned that the babies might be born prematurely and could be at risk, as multiple-birth infants often are.

But Khumbuzile wants answers. After her Caesarean section delivery she held her three boys and one girl in her arms for just a few minutes, looked at their tiny faces, counted their fingers and toes and already loved them with her whole heart.

She says the quads were taken away to be cleaned and placed in incubators and she was wheeled back to the ward. She saw them one more time that night – and then the night mare began.

A doctor and a nurse arrived at her bedside and, closing the cur­ tains around her bed, told her one of the babies had died.

“I screamed because I was told my babies were healthy,” she says.

“The staff even took photos , every body was happy for me.”

Over the next two days, she was told each of her children had died and her world crumbled.