ICYMI: The Facebook group Birth Without Fear recently posted a video showing a baby being born via C-section while still totally encased in the amniotic sac. As you can imagine, it’s getting a whole lot of attention.
Watch it below (that is, if you’re not easily squeamish):
In the video, which has more than 1.1 million views on Facebook, you see the doctor remove the bulbous sac that houses the infant—sort of like an alien water balloon—from the mother’s stomach. Then, inside the fluid-filled sac, you can see the baby peering out before the docs use their fingers to break the sac. The entire scene is super otherworldly (in a vaginal birth, the amniotic sac breaks on its own before delivery, so we never see it), prompting a lot of people to wonder whether this could be dangerous.
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As it turns out, this type of birth event—which isn’t very common—is generally not harmful, says Pari Ghodsi, M.D., an ob-gyn. “Normally, during labor, the amniotic sac breaks and fluid rushes out, which is where the term ‘breaking water’ comes from,” she says. “In a C-section, we typically break the bag of water prior to delivery of the baby. When the amniotic sac is still entirely enveloping the newborn child like this, it is called an en caul birth. En caul births are usually harmless, but with that said, the bag does need to be broken expediently so the baby can receive oxygen from the environment.”
Macaela MacKenzie is a journalist who writes about women and power. She covers women’s equality through the lenses of sports, wellness, and the gender gap across industries and is the author of MONEY, POWER, RESPECT: How Women in Sports Are Shaping the Future of Feminism. Mac was most recently a Senior Editor at Glamour where she directed all health and wellness coverage. Her work has appeared in Elle, Glamour, SELF, Bustle, Marie Claire, Allure, Women's Health, and Forbes among other publications.
