PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — In 2021, more than 9,000 babies were born within Virtua Health System, which shattered their previous records of new births. That's a baby boom of more than 7% up from 2020.
The parents of one of those thousands of newborns say they will have plenty of stories to tell their son about the year he was born.
On May 14, Moniquetta Shafer and L. Jeff Shafer II welcomed their son into the world: L. Jeff Shafer III.
Moniquetta says her pregnancy wasn’t easy, and going through it during a pandemic just added an extra layer of challenge.
"We definitely rode the waves of changing rules and regulations. … But it sure was worth it," the new mom said — a blessing coming during an overall tough year in a pandemic.
"It's going to be an amazing thing to be able to tell him that he came into this world fighting. And when the world had to do something that we hadn’t had to do, at least for our generation and a couple of the generations before us."
New dad Jeff agrees with his wife. He says Virtua's record-setting number of births goes to show "lights can shine bright even in dark places."
"The challenges that we may go through, regardless of the circumstances we may find ourselves in. The opportunity to be able to celebrate life, and bringing new life and possibilities and potential that represents is something that we should continue to strive for," Jeff said.
Virtua officials say they believe the increase in births was due to regular birth numbers mixed with the pandemic, and updates to their maternity wards and staff. In addition, at the Mt. Holly location, 79 babies born of women evacuated from Afghanistan, contributed to the record-breaking year
The challenges of parents were also felt by hospital staff, especially with extra babies, said Lauren Ochs, Virtua's vice president for women’s and children's services. Ochs says it was amazing to see.
"Everybody had a lot on their shoulders this year. And for them to come to work and do what they did with a record-setting number of babies across our health system, it was a really proud moment," Ochs said.