Mali Mother's 9 Babies Doing Well in Morocco Clinic

A member of staff surveys one of nine babies kept in incubators after they were born to a Malian woman at clinic in the Moroccan city of Casablanca - AFP
A member of staff surveys one of nine babies kept in incubators after they were born to a Malian woman at clinic in the Moroccan city of Casablanca - AFP
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Mali Mother's 9 Babies Doing Well in Morocco Clinic

A member of staff surveys one of nine babies kept in incubators after they were born to a Malian woman at clinic in the Moroccan city of Casablanca - AFP
A member of staff surveys one of nine babies kept in incubators after they were born to a Malian woman at clinic in the Moroccan city of Casablanca - AFP

The nine babies born to a Malian woman on May 4 are doing well but need to remain under observation for up to two more months, the Moroccan clinic where she delivered said Wednesday.

Abdelkoddous Hafsi, spokesman for Ain Borja clinic in the city of Casablanca, said the nonuplets were now breathing without assistance as they had "crossed the stage of respiratory distress".

They are being tube-fed and their weight has "significantly" increased, to between 800 grams and 1.4 kilograms (1.7 and three pounds), he told AFP.

The mother, 25-year-old Halima Cisse from Timbuktu in northern Mali, is staying near her five baby girls and four boys.

They still need "another month and a half or even two months to be able to face life" without the clinic's assistance, said Hafsi.

A medical team of 10 doctors assisted by 25 paramedics was mobilized for the multiple births by caesarian section.

Mali's government flew Cisse from the West African nation to Morocco for better care on March 30. She was initially believed, after ultrasounds, to have been carrying septuplets.

Cases of women successfully carrying septuplets to term are rare -- and nonuplets even rarer.

The verified world record for the most living births is eight, born to an American woman, Nadya Suleman, nicknamed "Octomum", in 2009 when she was 33.



SpaceX's Starship to Deploy Mock Satellites in Next Test

SpaceX logo and Elon Musk photo are seen in this illustration taken, December 19, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
SpaceX logo and Elon Musk photo are seen in this illustration taken, December 19, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
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SpaceX's Starship to Deploy Mock Satellites in Next Test

SpaceX logo and Elon Musk photo are seen in this illustration taken, December 19, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
SpaceX logo and Elon Musk photo are seen in this illustration taken, December 19, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

Elon Musk's SpaceX said upcoming Starship test flight would include the rocket's first attempt to deploy payloads in space by releasing 10 model Starlink satellites, a key demonstration for Starship's potential in the satellite launch market.

"While in space, Starship will deploy 10 Starlink simulators, similar in size and weight to next-generation Starlink satellites as the first exercise of a satellite deploy mission," SpaceX said in a blog post on its website, Reuters reported.

The Starship flight from SpaceX's sprawling Boca Chica, Texas facilities, tentatively planned for later this month, will mark the seventh demonstration in a test-to-failure style of rocket development where the company tests new upgrades with each flight.

In October, Starship's "Super Heavy" first stage booster returned to its launch pad's giant mechanical arms for the first time, a milestone for its fully reusable design.

The rocket's sixth test flight in November, attended by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, achieved similar mission objectives - besides the landing of Super Heavy, which was forced to target a water landing on the Gulf of Mexico because of a launchpad problem.

Starship is the centerpiece of SpaceX's future satellite launch business - an area it currently dominates with its partially reusable Falcon 9 - as well as Musk's dreams to colonize Mars.

The rocket's power, stronger than the Saturn V rocket that sent Apollo astronauts to the moon in the last century, is key for launching huge batches of satellites into low-Earth orbit and is expected to rapidly expand the company's Starlink satellite internet network.

SpaceX is under contract with NASA to land U.S. astronauts on the moon later this decade using Starship.

Musk, SpaceX's founder and CEO, has become a close ally of Trump who has made getting to Mars a more prominent goal for the incoming administration.