A member of the medical staff checks one of nine babies kept in incubators in Casablanca. AFP

Gulf Today Report

A woman from Mali has given birth to nine babies in an extremely rare case of nonuplets.

The newborns include five girls and four boys, according to the Malian health minister, Fanta Siby.

The babies and their 25-year-old mother were “doing well” after the birth, the minister said in a statement.

Halima Cisse had been expected to have seven babies, with ultrasounds missing the other two.

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The 25-year-old gave birth to nine babies on Tuesday in Morocco, where she had been transferred, according to the Independent. 

All babies were delivered by caesarean section.

Ms Cisse’s case has fascinated the West African nation and attracted the attention of its leaders.

When doctors in March said the 25-year-old needed specialist care, authorities flew her to Morocco, where she gave birth.

Before her transfer in late March, she had spent two weeks at a hospital in Bamako, Mali’s capital, according to the country’s health minister.

Nonuplets are extremely rare.

Medical complications in multiple births of this kind often mean that some of the babies do not reach full term.

The first recorded set on nonuplets was in Sydney in the 1970s. None of the babies survived.

Back in 2009, a woman gave birth to octuplets in the US, with all eight babies surviving past birth.

More recently, a woman inTexas gave birth to sextuplets - two sets of twin boys and one set of twin girls - in 2019.