What risks does Santiago’s kidnapping pose to the baby’s health?

He has still not been found. Monday evening, little Santiago, a 17-day-old premature newborn, disappeared. The infant was allegedly kidnapped by his parents, aged 23 and 25, from a hospital in Aulnay-sous-Bois, about twenty kilometers northeast of Paris. What consequences is this leak likely to have on the health of the infant?

“He needs urgent medical attention”

Santiago’s kidnapping took place between 11 p.m. and 11:30 p.m., the hospital being alerted by the disconnection of the cardiac sensors placed on the newborn placed in an incubator. The police were immediately notified, during the night from Monday to Tuesday shortly after midnight, by hospital staff.

The infant, born extremely premature at 7 months of pregnancy, requires “constant medical care”, the Ministry of Justice already warned in its kidnapping alert. Any disruption to this care is likely to be life-threatening.

Born extremely premature and vulnerable

According to several police sources, the baby’s mother is a drug addict and the authorities did not consider the young parents capable of safely caring for their child.

Considered extremely premature, Santiago was born at 7 months of pregnancy, but it is currently unknown whether little Santiago’s prematurity and vulnerability could be linked to his mother’s supposed drug addiction. What we know, based on the information available to date, is that after a stint in intensive care, the infant entered the neonatal department, and was still unable to feed from a bottle or breast.

“If the mother’s drug addiction was proven, this could have had an impact on the child’s health. Drug use during pregnancy is known to be the cause of prematurity and poor intrauterine development, with hypotrophic babies, that is to say with too low birth weight, explains Dr Brigitte Virey, pediatrician and president of the National Union of French Pediatricians (SNPF). Enough to justify the withdrawal of custody from the parents and which could explain the fact that they took away their own child.”

Multiple risks

In view of these elements, the kidnapping of little Santiago, who was hospitalized in the neonatal unit, poses multiple risks to his health. Several police sources have thus mentioned a critical threshold of around twelve hours before the child, without medical care, is in danger of death. “If the newborn was not ill and is ‘only’ premature, this period seems short, estimates Dr Virey. But it is very difficult to estimate without precise knowledge of the baby’s medical file: did he have a respiratory problem, did he need oxygen, did he suffer from an infectious problem? These responses could justify such a short delay. One thing is certain: there is a real overall fragility of this child.”

Especially since in practice, the newborn is incapable of feeding either from a bottle or from the breast. “Among very premature babies, it is very common to be fed by tube,” explains Dr. Virey. The duration of this stage will depend on several factors: the weight of the baby, his capacities, his term of prematurity and whether or not he is sick nearby. Here, if the child cannot eat enough, he will not gain weight, or even lose it,” emphasizes the pediatrician.

This means that, “after a while, since he has difficulty eating, he may get tired trying to take the breast or the bottle,” continues the pediatrician. And if he gets tired, he can experience desaturation, which corresponds to a drop in his oxygen level, because the effort required is too great for his abilities. His heart then functions less well, which we want to avoid at all costs. This is why babies who are born premature often wear a stomach tube for feeding until they are able to breastfeed. This also explains why very premature babies admitted to the neonatology department, who are fragile, wear cardiac sensors to be monitored.”

Beware of the risk of infection

And other factors make very premature babies even more vulnerable if they don’t get the medical care they need. “Newborns do not know how to regulate their body temperature, which is why we put them in an incubator or heated cradle,” as in the case of little Santiago, adds Dr. Virey. “They are very sensitive to the outside temperature, and even if at the moment it is fortunately not too cold, for a toddler like him, it is a risk: he must be well warmed.”

In addition, “we are entering the virus season,” warns the pediatrician. As a very premature baby, the baby will have an immaturity which will make him more sensitive to infections, in particular pulmonary immaturity which will mean that if he contracts RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) or a rhinovirus, which can give bronchiolitis represents a risk for one’s health because we know that it can be serious and require hospitalization and oxygen,” worries Dr. Virey.

Especially since there are also “all the other infectious problems that we can encounter,” she adds, “since these premature newborns do not have an immunity that allows them to defend themselves. We can then imagine everything: for example, if someone around them has whooping cough, the child risks contracting it and for them, it would be serious.”

For the moment, “neither the infant nor his parents have been found”, underlined the Bobigny prosecutor Eric Mathais, who is overseeing the investigation, in a new press release Wednesday afternoon.