Walking home after buying a crib for her baby, Claudineia dos Santos Melo was full of happy excitement. Almost 9 months pregnant, the Brazilian mum was in the thick of baby preparation as her due date fast approached.
Unbeknownst to the mum, she had walked directly into the crossfire of a shootout between drug traffickers and police. A stray bullet hit her in the hip and ripped through her womb, striking her baby.
Miracle baby
Still in the womb, Claudineia's baby son Arthur was hit square in the lungs. The bullet also rent off part of his ear and damaged his spine, according to reports.
The pregnant mum was rushed to hospital. Doctors performed an emergency caesarean, delivering little Arthur severely injured — but miraculously alive.
"We had never seen this before," said Rafael Lopes, head surgeon at the Moacyr Rodrigues de Carmo hospital in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where Arthur was delivered.
Baby Arthur is still fighting for his life, breathing with the help of machines. Currently, he is also paraplegic, though doctors cannot predict whether this will be permanent.
Yet the very fact that this baby survived such grave injuries at all is incredible. Gynaecologist José Carlos Oliveira called it "a miracle happening before our eyes".
"Today, he is paraplegic, but anything can happen in the life of this child," Oliveira added.
Little Arthur's uncle, Leonardo dos Santos, told the BBC that he dreamed of Arthur walking one day. "I want to see the baby grow strong and walk and run alongside the family."
Arthur's mum, Claudineia, is thankfully in stable, non-life-threatening condition. She suffered a fractured iliac wing.
The New York Post reports that there is an average of 13 shootings a day in Rio de Janeiro, causing many innocents to become victims of gun violence. The very same day Claudineia and her tot were shot, a mum and daughter were killed while caught in a police shootout near the iconic Maracana stadium.
“I hope no family has to go through what we are going through because it is too painful,” shared Arthur’s uncle, Walter de Melo.
We hope this strong tot will pull through and take his first steps one day. Our heartfelt thoughts go out to little Arthur and his family.