Third time’s a charm … squared?

By Abbie Wong

Photo by Tranmautritam from Pexels

Cats, as they say, have nine lives. Humans obviously don’t have nine lives, though some lucky people get a second chance after a short death. You know what humans can do though? House nine lives for nine months in their bodies. 

Unfortunately, history has indicated not all of those lives last for long after being pushed or cut out of the womb. In 1971, Geraldine Brodrick gave birth to nonuplets in Australia, none of whom survived a full week of living. Later in 1999, Zurina Mat Saad gave birth to nonuplets in Malaysia, and sadly none survived to even see a full day.

However, it’s important to acknowledge two things. Firstly, the past is far behind us. Secondly, it turns out third times really are charms. On May 4, Malian 25 year-old Halima Cisse gave birth to a set of nonuplets. Initially believed to be a mother to septuplets, she was transferred to a Moroccan hospital to receive better treatment as her pregnancy baffled Malian health workers. Said Moroccan treatment missed two children in ultrasounds, but that’s a nitpick. After all, the children born have been declared as “doing well so far” by Cisse’s husband. This is clearly an understatement though, as all nine children were able to live past a week.

Following the Muslim tradition of naming children a week after their birth, Cisse was able to give her nonuplets names: Hawa, Adama, Fatouma, Oumou and Kadidia for the girls and Elhadji, Oumar, Bah and Mohamed for the boys. The latter two are named after the Malian president and Moroccan king, respectively, which was an act of thanks to the countries’ authorities for their assistance with her unusual pregnancy.

The drastic difference between the result of Saad’s nonuplets and Cisse’s shows the progress that the medical field has made in just over two decades. From the 1990s, where not a single child in a group of nonuplets would live beyond a week, to the 2020s where a set of nonuplets have a bright future. It’s possible the medical field took even less time than that, as a set of octuplets were not only successfully birthed in early 2009 by the then 34-year old Nadya Sulleman in California, but all of the siblings are also now twelve years old, and healthy though they have been described as small for their age by the New York Times. This made them the first full set of octuplets to survive past a week, after many other instances where only some or none of the children lived.

As Hawa, Adama, Fatouma, Oumou, Kadida, Elhadji, Oumar, Bah and Mohamed grow up, time will only tell if they’ll get as much press coverage as Nadya Sulleman and her octuplets did. Perhaps not, seeing Sulleman was given the nickname “Octomum” upon the birth of her octuplets, while Cisse is yet to receive any nickname from the press.

Clinical Casablanca Ain Borja, in which Halima Cisse birthed her nonuplets. (From AP)