A baby boy has broken the birthweight records at Life Beacon Bay Hospital in KuGompo (East London), tipping the scales at 6.37kg when he was born on 20 September, and smashing the facility’s previous record of 5.42kg set in 2019, reports News24.
Born to Lisolethu Nzungu and Athini Thene, Izimakhe was delivered via Caesarean section. Nzungu (35) from Mdantsane said he was her second child.
They were discharged on 22 September.
Lyndee Hartwanger, Life Beacon Bay’s hospital manager, said the previous case recorded at the facility was in 2019 – a girl weighing 5.42kg.
The average weight for a baby in South Africa is between 2.5kg and 4kg.
The biggest baby ever born in the country was Sithandiwe Simane, who weighed 10.2kg when he was delivered on 24 May 1982 through Caesarean section at Sipetu Hospital in Ntabankulu, Eastern Cape. He died of heart failure at the age of seven.
In 2007, Chesner Abels weighed 7.340kg when she was born at Tygerberg Hospital in the Western Cape, while Blessing Maile weighed 6.68kg when he was born at Mankweng Hospital in Limpopo in 2013.
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