Nursing on the Zika front line

Paediatric nurse Roberta Seabra quickly and quietly takes control when the mother of baby Graziella breaks down. Ushering visitors from the room, she reassures Inabela Souza about her six-month-old daughter, who has been born with an abnormally small head and brain - one of 5,000 babies thought to be affected by microcephaly in Brazil.

Dealing with a patient with a profound congenital defect

Miss O is a 23 year old unmarried sister of an 8 year old boy diagnosed as having microcephaly. The family lives in a shanty house (‘Umjondolo’) at Kwa Makhutha but uses a relative’s house for the official address because the family is not entitled to health care locally if they are not registered as residents. Miss O’s parents died when her brother was only 6 months old and she was 15. “We were 8 in the family, 4 boys and 4 I am the eldest and this boy was my mother’s last child. I was not aware that the baby had a problem when he was still very small. As I grew older 1 noticed that his head was small but I thought he just had a small head which was relatively normal. I had to assume the responsibility of taking care of my younger brothers and sisters as the older sister.