Poverty kills 3 of quadruplets

All-girl quadruplets were born to a young couple from Caloocan City on Tuesday morning but three of them died after being denied treatment by hospitals allegedly for financial reasons.

The three girls — Ma. Angelica, Ma. Angeline and Ma. Therese Calisaan — died after being shuffled in two hospitals shortly after they were born prematurely.

The sole survivor, Ma. Jobel, is fighting for her life at the pediatric intensive care unit of the Dr. Jose Fabella Memorial Hospital in Sta. Cruz, Manila.

"Her condition is unstable. Her chance of survival is 50/50 but we are doing our best to save the baby," the maternity hospital director Dr. Ruben Flores said.

According to the quadruplets’ mother Jocelyn, there would be no wake for the three babies.

"We’ll just have them blessed by a priest and we will bury them. We don’t want any fanfare for them anymore," she said.

The children’s father, Vladimir, a delivery van driver, said that his wife, who was only on her sixth month of pregnancy, gave birth at 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday at the Espiritu maternity clinic on 6th Avenue in Caloocan City.

Born 15 minutes apart, the quadruplets weighed only from 500 to 1,000 grams and were very weak.

Vladimir said the doctors instructed him to bring the babies to the nearby Manila Central University (MCU) Hospital for treatment as the facilities at the lying-in clinic were not enough for the young girls.

However, Vladimir said that at around 4 p.m., the MCU instructed him to transfer the babies to other hospitals as the MCU also did not have the facilities to treat them.

Vladimir expressed suspicion that the MCU personnel advised them to transfer when they sensed that they could not afford to pay the hospital bills.

The staff, he said, coordinated with other hospitals, including the Philippine General Hospital (PGH), for their transfer. To his dismay, Vladimir said he was told that the PGH was demanding P20,000 deposit for each of the four babies before they could be admitted.

"Bali P80,000 po yun dahil apat ang anak ko. Wala po kaming ganoon kalaking pera (That would habe been P80,000. We don’t have that amount of money)," he said.

The quadruplets were then brought to the Fabella hospital on an ambulance at around 6 p.m. However, the hospital said they have no incubator for babies.

Flores explained that Fabella has around 20 incubators for babies born in the hospital but their three incubators for "out-born" (born in other hospitals) infants at the pediatric ICU were not working.

"The quadruplets were not born in Fabella and we could not mix them with babies born here because they might spread infection," Flores said.

The babies were placed on respirator but three of them died a few hours later. Vladimir said the first died at 11 p.m., the second at 2 a.m. and the third at 4 a.m.

The National Children’s Hospital has lent the Fabella Hospital an incubator for Ma. Jobel, who weighs only 900 grams.

To make matters worse, Vladimir said he was made to pay P15,000 by the MCU hospital for about five hours of treatment and another P5,900 for the ambulance that brought them to Fabella.

"Nangutang lang po ako para mailabas ko yung mga bata at madala sa Fabella (I just borrowed money so that I can bring the babies to Fabella)," he said.

In an official statement released to the media by the MCU hospital, Dr. Raquel M. So-Sayo, medical director, said that all resuscitative measures and newborn care were given to the infants.

"Since our isolation room can accommodate only three premature babies, which were all occupied at that time, we coordinated with many hospitals for the transfer. Jose Fabella Hospital accepted our referral and the babies were transported after five hours of stay in our hospital," she said.

"The bill incurred total P8,899.35 for all the four babies. There was never an attempt to ask for deposit because admission cannot be made as all our incubators were occupied. There was never any moment that treatment were withheld because of financial concern. All treatment modalities were given," she explained further. — With Cecille Suerte Felipe, Jerry Botial