Ambalappuzha: Sibeena is merely 32, but she has fostered 54 newborns over the past one year.

A nurse attached to the Medical College Hospital in Alappuzha, Sibeena, has been looking after the infants of coronavirus infected mothers. 

She is happy to play mother to all babies kept in neonatal intensive care units, until their mothers return healthy and cured of COVID-19. Sibeena says the happiest moment is when she hands over the babies to their biological mothers. 

The young nurse has been in the thick of the battle against the pandemic ever since it made its presence felt in Kerala on January 30, 2020. Sibeena has nursed the first-ever Covid patient in India, a Malayali medical student from Wuhan, China, who had tested positive on her return home. 

Sibeena’s duty will end on Thursday, the day on which Kerala will celebrate Eid-ul-Fitr. Last year, however, the nurse could not go home since she had to remain on duty. Her family, too, did not celebrate Eid-ul-Fitr last year. 

Sibeena lives with her husband Thaiparambil Kunjumon and eight-year-old son Safal at Canal Ward in Alappuzha.