We are in a context of COVID-19 pandemic for over a year, everything turned more complicated in general and mostly very different in everyone’s life, but for Mónica and Pedro, a couple from Peso da Régua, the child, Miguel, came at the right time. The birth, at Hospital da Luz Vila Real maternity, is the starting point for the TVI story – broadcasted on April 15, in “Jornal da 8”, entitled “How is it like to be born and die in the pandemic”. One of the goals of this story was to show how pregnant women and their families are living the arrival of a child . After beating in 2020 the record of births, with 224 babies, the maternity of Hospital da Luz Vila Real expects to help deliver, this year, about 300 babies. The obstetrician Alexandre Carvalho explains that the majority of doubts of the women followed at this hospital have to do with vaccination and the fear that Covid-19 may cause malformation in the foetus. However, with determination and precaution, it all can be overcome. And all women admit that even their families cling to “that new life with all their strength”. “Left behind: how is it like to be born and die in the pandemic”
