25-yr-old Palm Beach County woman was pregnant - Baby survived

[JimO]

Source: http://www.cbs12.com/news/county-4719530-palm-beach.html

BREAKING NEWS: Palm Beach County Swine Flu victim was pregnant; baby was saved

July 10, 2009 - 8:31 AM

CBS 12 News has learned that the 25-year old Palm Beach County woman who died from the H1N1 virus, or swine flu, was pregnant. According to the Palm Beach County Health Department, her baby was saved.

The State Laboratory says this brings the state total to seven deaths of H1N1. The World Health Organization has now elevated this virus to a level 6 and declared it a pandemic.

The latest information shows there have been 1781 confirmed cases in Florida with Palm Beach County having 146 and new reports coming in daily.

Health Department Acting Director, Alina Alonso, M.D. said, ?Our sympathies go out to the friends and family of this young woman. I am also asking all to remain alert to the signs and symptoms of this flu and seek medical attention if the fever, coughs and sneezes worsen.?

WHO?s decision to raise the pandemic alert level to Phase 6 is a reflection of the spread of the virus, not the severity of illness caused by the virus. It?s uncertain at this time how serious or severe this novel H1N1 pandemic will be in terms of how many people infected will develop serious complications or die from novel H1N1 infection. Experience with this virus so far is limited and influenza is unpredictable. However, because novel H1N1 is a new virus, many people may have little or no immunity against it, and illness may be more severe and widespread as a result. In addition, currently there is no vaccine to protect against novel H1N1 virus.

 

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Re: 25-yr-old Palm Beach County woman was pregnant - Baby survived

5-week-old born before his mother died of swine flu clings to life at Boynton hospital

By STACEY SINGER
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 21, 2009

BOYNTON BEACH — Inside baby Brice's incubator, nurses have placed a picture of the mother who will never hold him.

It's a child's school picture, all her aunt could find in the grief-filled days immediately after Latoya Riley of Delray Beach succumbed to swine flu on June 26.

Baby James "Brice" Lamarr Baisden Jr. was delivered prematurely on June 17, hours after his mother was admitted to Bethesda Memorial Hospital in Boynton Beach, nearly seven months pregnant and feverish.

Riley, 25, fell into a coma that night, and died nine days later. The day care worker had become Palm Beach County's first victim of the pandemic H1N1 flu strain. She never did manage to hold her little boy, her third son. But her picture watches over him, an angel dressed in a Sunday-school blue dress.

Today, baby Brice is doing better and has gained weight, up from 2.7 pounds to over 3 pounds, said Gladys Clinton, the aunt who had raised Latoya. Clinton said it gives her happiness to see her sister's grandson kicking and stretching his long, thin limbs as he grows stronger under the care of the nurses at Bethesda Memorial's neonatal intensive care unit.

"They told me she had pneumonia. It was only later the health department called and said she had H1N1," Clinton said, standing next to the baby's incubator during a visit on Tuesday. Baby Brice clutched her finger. He gazed up at her in recognition, sucking at the tube in his mouth.

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Latoya Riley had graduated from Atlantic High School. She received her child development associate license from Palm Beach Community College. She had been working as a day care worker at the Achievement Center for Children & Families in Delray Beach for about five months, Clinton said.

Latoya Riley had not worked while ill, said Stephanie Seibel, executive director of the child care center's foundation. There have been no unusual spikes in illnesses at the child care center, she said.

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