When she was born, the baby girl weighed as much as an apple – just 8.6 ounces. She was only expected to live for about one hour, but miraculously, she survived. Over time, the micro-preemie baby gained weight and nurses gave her a name – Saybie. Now little Saybie has officially been recognized as the smallest baby ever known to have survived, according to the “Tiniest Babies Registry” maintained by the University of Iowa.
One nurse at the hospital calls Saybie “an absolute miracle,” explaining, “We don’t use that word lightly.”
The hospital has revealed that Saybie was born in December, just 23 weeks and 3 days into her mother’s 40-week pregnancy. Doctors had performed an emergency C-section because the mother’s life was in immediate danger.
“It was the scariest day of my life,” her mother recalls. “They told my husband we had about an hour with her and that she was going to pass away. But that hour turned into two hours, which turned into a day, which turned into a week.”
Pro-lifers argue that if doctors and nurses can provide the care needed for a baby as young as 23 weeks gestation to survive, then why is abortion ok? They say Saybie is the latest proof that unborn babies are human beings with the right to life.
Pro-choicers use arguments like, “it’s just a clump of cells,” “it’s only part of the mother’s body,” or “abortions are needed when the mother’s life is at risk.”
But Saybie was a fully formed, distinctly separate human being after just 23 weeks of pregnancy, born to a mother whose life was at risk.
Penny Nance of Concerned Women for America says Saybie is proof that science is on the side of the pro-life cause.
Her story has been told in a video released by Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women and Newborns. One nurse said, “We could see her strength even when the other people on the team couldn’t. She’s a miracle, that’s for sure.”
More than five months later, Saybie has now gone home as a healthy baby, weighing five pounds. Pro-lifers say it’s a true testimony to the legitimacy of fetal heartbeat abortion bans that have been passed by numerous states this year.
Twitterer Dan Proft says, “In defense of Heartbeat bills around the nation, I call Baby Saybie as my first witness. #prolife.”