Mother, 33 years old, died of COVID-19 just 18 days after giving birth to a newborn baby

Eighteen days after Erica Besera gave birth, she Fought for her life, Connected to a ventilator in Detroit Hospital.

Besera, 33, who was diagnosed with COVID-19 by a shy 9-month-pregnant woman on November 7, was otherwise healthy and excited to have her second child, according to relatives. Was there.

Initially, her coronavirus symptoms were manageable at home. With soreness and chest tightness, Bethera’s aunt and godfather Claudia Garcia said.

But then Bethera began to have breathing problems, and her husband, a landscape architect, rushed her to the hospital by ambulance. As her condition worsened day by day, doctors chose to induce Besera on November 15, a few weeks before her due date, Garcia said.

Bethera’s son, Diego, was born healthy. However, there was confusion following his birth. Bethera’s oxygen levels plummeted, a doctor at Henry Ford Hospital told Garcia. Instead of hugging her boy, Besera had to be intubated.

According to a distraught family, she never had the opportunity to hold a newborn baby. At one point, doctors told Garcia that hospital staff brought the baby close to her cheeks and felt the presence of her mother, but the family did not know if Besera knew that Diego was there.

Bethera initially responded to eye and hand movements during the first few days of intubation, but her condition worsened. She died on December 3rd.

“I’m speechless about the reality of this,” Garcia, 41, told NBC News. “We want everyone to understand the tragic consequences of this damn virus. We don’t want anyone to feel this pain.”

Besera recently moved to Detroit from her hometown of East Los Angeles and was a housewife for her daughter, who turned one year old while Besera was on a ventilator.

Garcia, who lives in Fontana, California, spoke daily with Bethera’s doctor and shared that information with her Spanish-speaking husband and parents. Garcia jumped every time the phone rang. I was afraid that it would be bad news.

She said Bethera’s death surprised her close family. Bethera was “happy-so yes, happy” to take the little boy to his family, Garcia said. Diego was named after his father, Diego Besera, and Erica Guadalupe, the couple’s first child, was named after her. Besera gave her daughter Lupita a nickname.

Her family described Besera as selfless and compassionate.

“Erica was the most amazing person you’ve ever met,” said her brother Miguel Abiles. Said This week’s CNN wept. “For her, the happiness of others was her happiness.”

Bethera’s family does not know where she got the coronavirus, but believes it was during her hospital visit when she began contracting preterm birth. According to Garcia, the doctor told her family that her death was due to the coronavirus and not a complication of pregnancy or childbirth. (Detroit’s Henry Ford Health System declined to comment because of patient privacy law.)

Pregnant women’s deaths from COVID-19 are rare, but unheard of, said Dr. Stephanie Go, an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology and reproductive science at the University of California, San Francisco.

“In most cases, we know that there are very mild or asymptomatic cases that do not require hospitalization,” she said. “But we also found that if you need to be hospitalized for COVID, you are much more likely to get sick and more likely to get sick than if you were not pregnant compared to women of the same age. I am. “

Last month, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention added pregnancy to the list of conditions that are likely to have serious or fatal complications from COVID-19. It is based on a large study of pregnant women. found A 70% increased risk of death compared to non-pregnant symptomatological women.

Still, Gaw said the overall risk of death for pregnant women with the coronavirus remains low.

“You are at a very high risk of getting sick, but fortunately most people don’t get that much,” she said. Still, pregnant women wear masks, increase social distance, wash their hands well, and “really choose who to interact with” to reduce their chances of getting a coronavirus. She said she needed to take action.

Bethera took all these steps, but she still got sick, Garcia said.Her death comes like the United States look Record increase in confirmed COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

The virus has disproportionately and violently attacked minorities, including the Latin community. Garcia urged fellow Latino Americans to take the illness seriously.

“Not everyone will succeed,” she said.

No one else in Bethera’s family tested positive for the coronavirus, including Diego, who had been monitored in the hospital for several days since he was born. The newborn and his sister are being cared for by their father and Bethera’s parents who flew from California to Detroit to sit on the bedside of her hospital for the last moment. Garcia is now saying goodbye via FaceTime.

Bethera’s family will hold a small memorial service in Detroit. Garcia launched the GoFundMe page to raise money for the funeral. As of Wednesday afternoon, we received over $ 86,000 in donations, primarily from strangers. Garcia said she was overwhelmed by her generosity.

“We come from a very humble background,” Garcia said. “We don’t want much. She doesn’t want much.”

Bethera’s family puts an overflow of donations to raise their children. Garcia plans to talk about her mother as her children grow older. How Besera lovingly rubs her pregnant belly into Diego. How she plays gently with Rupita. And how everyone she met fell in love with her “beautiful soul.”

“I will ensure that their moms live forever in their hearts,” Garcia said. “They will know who their mom is.”

This story was originally published NBC News..