A woman who had been infected with the H7N9 virus gave birth to a baby girl on Wednesday, a feat doctors are calling a miracle.

Qiu Yan, a 25-year-old from Zhenjiang, Jiangsu province, is reportedly the first H7N9 survivor to give birth. Doctors at Jiangsu Provincial People's Hospital said she underwent daily X-rays and used antibiotics to fight off the H7N9 flu during her pregnancy.

On April 6, she was sent to the intensive care unit in Zhenjiang First People's Hospital for a serious fever and breathing difficulties. Two days later she was diagnosed with the H7N9 bird flu virus in the fifth month of her pregnancy.

Sun Lizhou, an obstetrician at Jiangsu Provincial People's Hospital who examined Qiu, recalled that the patient was in a "very serious condition" when she was admitted to the local hospital.

"Her lung was severely infected and she needed a respirator to breathe because she was suffering from respiratory failure," she said.

"Doctors were carefully using medications including antibiotics, antiviral medicines and hormone treatments in the hope of protecting both the mother and the child," Sun said. "She needed to take X-rays every day when her lung was infected, so I suggested putting her into anti-radiation clothing."

On May 14, Qiu was cured of the lung infection and discharged from the ICU. She stayed in the obstetrics department and stayed there until she gave birth to a 3.3-kilogram, 50-centimeter baby girl.

"It was a miracle," Sun said.

The first cases of H7N9 infection broke out in China in March. Health officials contained it several months later but not before the virus spread to 132 people on the Chinese mainland, claiming 43 lives by June 30.

Qiu and her child are currently in stable condition, hospital officials said. But doctors will need to follow up with Qiu's child regularly for any possible symptoms from the H7N9 virus through the age of 3, Sun said.

Su Suiqing, an expert with the National Center for Women and Children's Health at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said, "If a woman gets a viral infection in the first three months of her pregnancy, it may pose a high risk to the fetus.

"Miscarriage and deformation are common outcomes. But getting infected in the fifth month or later is less harmful."

Tong Zhaohui, a respiratory expert and vice-president of Chaoyang Hospital in Beijing, said a fetus usually faces risks if a pregnant woman takes medication, but the risks are much lower if she is about to give birth.

Tong cited a similar case where a woman had a Caesarian and gave birth to a child while medical workers provided her emergency care for her H1N1 infection.

Contact the writers at wangqingyun@chinadaily.com.cn and shiyingying@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily USA 07/19/2013 page3)